


Following the Stars

by listenforthelove



Category: As the World Turns, Doctor Who
Genre: M/M, Minor Character Death, OCs (of the alien kind), post-show Doctor Who crossover
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-02
Updated: 2015-01-02
Packaged: 2018-03-05 00:54:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 29,134
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3098975
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/listenforthelove/pseuds/listenforthelove
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's been almost two years since Noah moved to L.A., and he's struggling to complete his latest film project. Luckily, he meets with distraction, which comes in the shape of a strange blue box and an even stranger man who calls himself the Doctor.<br/>Mean while, Luke spends the afternoon at the Snyder pond, enjoying the nice weather and trying to figure out a small mystery. That moment is rudely interrupted when an outdated police box lands at his feet out of nowhere, only to take him on a journey beyond the stars.</p><p>Written in 2012 for the Nuke Big Bang on LJ.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Stars of days past

**Author's Note:**

> In 2012, I participated in the Nuke Big Bang on Livejournal for the second time, this time with fic. I decided on a Doctor Who crossover, using the Eleventh Doctor, casually placed around the episode Closing Time, when he's traveling alone.
> 
> Below are my original notes from the summer of 2012.  
> (Please also note I'm not an English native speaker, and this is an older fic. I hope there aren't too many mistakes, but my apologies if there are.)
> 
> \----
> 
> Don't worry if you're not familiar with Doctor Who and the Doctor - neither are the boys ;) This comes with over 2k of explanatory notes, because my spacey-wacey rambling got a bit out of hand. This has a lot of 'firsts' for me, including being my first proper multi-chaptered fanfic, so I can only hope it's not all that horrible. With my infinite thanks to my dear friend River, who put up with me as I whined my way through the writing process and was awesome enough to read the terrible first draft for me. I've read and reread and rewrote it as much as time allowed me to; all remaining mistakes and failures are my own.  
> Thank you big bang mods for making all of this possible yet again this year!

Maybe, if Noah Mayer had taken a different route to his apartment that day, nothing would have changed much in his life for years to come. On the other hand, maybe there was such a thing as destiny in the world.  
  
Whatever the case, it remained a fact Noah took a different route that Thursday afternoon in August, and that he passed an unassuming street corner close to his apartment.  
  
On any other day, Noah probably wouldn’t have noticed much that seemed out of the ordinary on his route. His mind tended to be elsewhere, mostly with his current filming project these days. Today, he would just be glad to be distracted from his thoughts, no matter what.  
  
His current project seemed doomed to fail. He’d lost count on how many actors had bailed out on him, how many meetings had been postponed or simply cancelled over the last couple of months. It was only his second major project since coming out to Los Angeles, and he wanted to do this right. No matter how many times he tried to tell himself this really wasn’t his fault, it didn’t stop his frustrations with himself.  
  
It was in times like these he missed Oakdale more than ever. Of course he went back ever so often, mostly for the holidays, but it was different now. His friends were busy studying or working, and no matter how welcoming the Snyders were, they had their own lives too. And then there was Luke, whom he missed most of all.  
  
Noah had told Luke he’d be waiting for him, and he still was, mostly patiently. The problem was that he had no idea if Luke was ever going to be ready to come and see him.  
  
It had been almost two years now since Noah had moved to L.A. They kept in touch, but carefully avoided the question of Luke coming over. Instead, they talked about a lot of other things, and Noah still didn’t have the impression he knew what Luke was up to now. He knew the hospital wing was coming along nicely now that constructions were finished, he knew Ethan had grown like crazy since the last time Noah had seen him. He knew a lot of things, but he didn’t know all that much about Luke, which frustrated him more than cancelled appointments. Last two Christmases, he’d probably spent more time with Luke’s siblings than with Luke himself. Though he did love Ethan and the girls, that didn’t sit right with him.  
  
And okay, maybe Noah was too busy to be involved with anyone not work-related, but he wasn’t sure about Luke. That was another matter they avoided talking about.  
  
Noah wanted to be happy, he really did. He was living his dream here in L.A., even if things weren’t coming along smoothly right now, but there was missing something in that dream. Someone, to be more precise.  
  
  
Noah tried to push those thoughts away, concentrating on his surroundings and absorbing everything he saw for a change. That was how he noticed, truly saw the box that stood in that street corner close to his apartment.  
  
The big blue box, proudly announcing ‘police box’ on the top, immediately got all of Noah’s attention. It wasn’t like he hadn’t seen odd boxes in the streets before, but they had mostly been on film sets and had almost always been a movie prop. This was the real deal, no cardboard involved. This was a genuine, if outdated, blue police box in a street corner in L.A., simple as that.  
  
Until the door opened, Noah had still been thinking it wasn’t actually something you could enter. It was probably just a decoration, or maybe a modern piece of art, even if there was no indication for that hypothesis. Except the door  _did_ open, and a man simply walked out just as comfortably as if he was exiting his house. Well, comfortably if you ignored him almost tripping over his own two feet, that is.  
  
The stranger lifted his sunglasses to look up at the buildings around them. “Ah, yes, America! Not Chicago, by any chance?” he said to no-one in particular, or at least Noah assumed so, since the man didn’t look at him at all and probably hadn’t even noticed him.  
  
Noah just stared at him for a minute, trying to work out what in the world was going on here and coming up completely empty. “Ehm, no, this would be Los Angeles,” he said, figuring he might as well answer the question.  
  
“Blimey!” The stranger turned around his ash, still looking up. “Well, seems like I’ve gotten the period right this time, still the twenty-first century by the looks of it. Could have been worse. Oh, excuse me, and you are?”  
  
He had now turned to Noah, cracking a big goofy smile at him, as if there was nothing strange at all about stepping out of a blue box, asking for his whereabouts and rattling on about time periods. His looks drew as much attention to him as his words did: the tweed jacket, the braces, and the dark red bowtie he was sporting made him look out of place, almost out of time. Maybe he was an actor after all, trying to get into his role? Whatever role that may be.  
  
Either way, Noah was immediately on his guard. “Sorry, but I was just passing by. You’re the one who jumped out of a box.”  
  
“Excellent point.” Now that Noah was paying attention to his words, the stranger sounded pretty… well, he sounded British. “Well then, innocent passerby, do you have a name by any chance?”  
  
Noah raised his eyebrow. “Are you kidding me here?”  
  
“Oh no, not in the slightest, I will have you know I’m always very serious and completely sincere. I’m truly interested, not ‘kidding you’ here,” the man said, mimicking Noah’s choice of words, “as I was about to ask for your assistance, and it feels more personal to get a name first.” He wrung his hands as he looked at Noah expectantly, then giving the blue box a concerned look.  
  
Noah could take a hint. “What, you need help moving that box of yours?” Maybe there was a rational explanation to all of this after all.  
  
“Exactly, except not at all.” Apparently that made sense to the man himself, as he rattled on undisturbed. “You see, this box of mine is much more than you appear to give her credit for, but I lost quite an essential part on my way here. One might even say it’s the most essential part.” He seemed rather enthusiastic about losing things, though he was kind of fidgety and patting the box almost apologetically. Maybe he was just worked up.  
  
Noah had no idea what to think anymore, other than that this man was either hopelessly confused or a really good actor. In either case, he quickly decided that playing along might be the best option. “Okay, well, what are we looking for?” he thus asked.  
  
The man shuffled his feet a bit. “It’s, eh, mostly a screwdriver if you’re going to get technical. It must have rolled out when the door opened for a bit earlier. Copper plating, green diode on the top, the usual, quite a nifty tool. Oh, and it is sonic, amongst other things,” he added, as if that was just a passing thought.  
  
“It’s sonic.” Noah blinked as he processed that information. “What, you’re looking for a sonic screwdriver?”  
  
“Well, if you must insist. Are you helping me then, Noah Mayer?”  
  
Noah’s jaw dropped in surprise. “How do you…”  
  
“It’s on your bag, come on,” the man said, visibly impatient now. “So I guess this means we’re skipping the formalities. Fine. You can call me the Doctor.”  
  
Noah quickly glanced at the bag he carried that held the scripts. It did have his name on it, making this revelation slightly less creepy, but it meant this man had paid unusual attention to him seconds after meeting him, which was a rather scary thought. “Eh. The Doctor?” He didn’t have a great experience with doctors, to put it mildly.  
  
“Yes, that’ll do nicely. Now, it should be around here somewhere…”  
  
  
Within the next ten minutes, Noah found the object this Doctor had described. It indeed vaguely resembled a screwdriver, though he didn’t care much about finding out the ‘sonic’ part. It had rolled into a gutter, gathering dirt in the process which had camouflaged it rather well. Carefully, Noah picked it up, not entirely sure how dangerous it might or might not be.  
  
“Found it,” he announced, as he tapped the Doctor on his back. He’d been kneeling in front of the box, looking around its edges, and jumped up startled at Noah’s touch. His face brightened when he saw the screwdriver.  
  
“Ah, splendid!” He got up so quickly he almost knocked Noah over. “Now then, on to the repairs, and other essential stuff. Come on, you can help me.”  
  
And before Noah had any chance to protest or tell him he didn’t have time – which he actually didn’t, not really – the Doctor dragged him back to the blue box. He opened it by pushing the door, and Noah was just about to ask how in the world two people were ever going to fit inside, until…  
  
“Wow.”  
  
That settled it: the blue police box was definitely not a movie prop. It was impossibly and overwhelmingly large on the inside, and if it didn’t look so shiny and technologically advanced, Noah would almost say it was – alive. There was something very organic about the way the walls curved, not to mention the circles and holes that covered the walls and ground. And why were there even  _stairs_?  
  
“Welcome into my TARDIS,” the Doctor said behind him. He seemed quite pleased to see the look on Noah’s face, which was no doubt one of amazement. His jaw had dropped again. “Ah yes, she’s quite a beauty, isn’t she?”  
  
“It’s…” Amazing, impossible, like a dream. All those terms applied, and yet Noah only had one very obvious remark. “It’s bigger on the inside.”  
  
“That too, yes.”  
  
When he’d been blind, even though it had been for a relatively short time on retrospect, Noah had been missing his sight so very much. Everything he saw after getting his eyesight back had seemed like a small miracle, so he would say he was almost used to not believing his own two eyes. There were a lot of things he hadn’t been expecting to ever see, but this surely took the cake.  
  
“How is this even possible?”  
  
“I think it’s safe to say that it is both a very long story as well as completely irrelevant,” the Doctor said. “The more important part is how she’s my spaceship.”  
  
“Your space…” Even though he’d just seen the impossible, this went too far for Noah. “Get out of here.”  
  
“I could, but then I’d have to take the TARDIS with me, and since you’re still inside, that might get a little complicated.” He looked up as if he saw Noah for the first time now. “ _Oh_. You don’t believe me, do you?”  
  
“And that surprises you?”  
  
“Your lot always manages to surprise me in some way, that’s for sure,” the Doctor said, musing his words for a bit. “You know what? You should come with me on a trip. One trip, anywhere you’d like to go.”  
  
That comment was the last drop. “You can stop now,” Noah said. “With this act, or whatever it is. Look, it’s very impressive you managed to make the inside look like, well,  _this_ , but it’s not a spaceship, because that’s impossible. It’s still a  _box_ , not a rocket.”  
  
“Well, it’s only improbable,” the Doctor said, “by no means impossible, and I can prove it to you. It’s by no means more impossible than what you’re seeing around you right now, and that’s real, isn’t it? Surely you trust your own senses?”  
  
Noah had had reasons before not to trust his own senses, but he didn’t feel like confessing that to a total stranger. “I’m going to get out now,” he said, backing away from the Doctor and towards the door that would lead him back to the world he knew.  
  
“Oh, come on, one trip,” the Doctor said, “the TARDIS for one will want to prove you wrong. There must be a place you want to visit.”  
  
Of course there was, that was the problem. “Look, you’ve distracted me long enough, I really should go now.”  
  
“Really?” The Doctor seemed skeptic. “Because I had the impression you didn’t truly mind being distracted. All those people walked right past the TARDIS minding their own business, but you were staring from before I even stepped out.” He walked to the middle of the room, which had a raised platform and some kind of control panel full of levers and switches. “I could just take you somewhere,” the Doctor now said, his hand lingering over one particularly large switch. “Or you can tell me what place it is you want to visit. Of course, nothing should happen at all according to you, so where is the harm in telling me?”  
  
Noah wanted to argue with him, but something in the way he’d said it made him rethink that. And of course, there was that promise… “Anywhere, you said?”  
  
“Absolutely anywhere,” the Doctor said, cracking a broad smile. “Beyond your wildest dreams. So, what is it going to be?”  
  
  
He hadn’t known what he had expected, really, except for maybe nothing happening at all and the Doctor declaring this was a joke and that he was in some kind of reality show. That is, until the Doctor started to push some buttons, pull some switches, and the TARDIS made noises that indicated that at the very least  _some_ thing was happening.  
  
He started believing just a little when the Doctor opened the door for him.  
  
Admittedly, Noah could have taken a plane to get here, or even gone on a road trip. He’d been considering to do that soon anyway, if he hadn’t been so busy – if he hadn’t also been busy making up excuses. He’d wanted to go so badly, but he was also afraid he would only end up getting hurt. This wasn’t the ideal solution, but it was much better than he could have hoped for.  
  
The Doctor stayed behind in the TARDIS as Noah stepped out, taking a small walk before he reached a spot behind the trees from which he had a good view.  
  
Later, he’d think that maybe he should have asked how the Doctor (or maybe just the TARDIS on her own) had landed at the exact spot Noah had requested in Oakdale, Illinois, if he hadn’t even be sure whether he’d landed in Chicago or in Los Angeles the first time. For now, Noah was just glad to be back at the Snyder pond and forgot all of his suspicions and worries momentarily. The place held a lot of memories, not necessarily all good ones, but it was still part of a place he’d like to call ‘home’ in a way.  
  
What moved him most wasn’t the nature around him. He barely even noticed the way the water reflected the sunlight and the green of the trees, colors and shapes that normally drew out the director in him. Instead, he was more distracted by the two figures who had appeared in the distance, two figures he knew all too well.  
  
It wasn’t hard to recognize the familiar shapes of Luke and Ethan, even from this distance. Ethan came running all the way to the edge of the pond, and Luke caught up with him just in time to prevent him from tumbling in. Ethan let out a yelp that mixed with laughter when Luke raised him in the air, yelling something Noah couldn’t make out.  
  
It punched him right in the gut. He wanted to rush forward so badly, be a part of that little scene, take over Ethan from Luke and hug him, hug  _Luke_. And he found he couldn’t, even if he took away the mess it would be to explain his sudden presence here. It was fear, mostly. Fear of Luke not wanting him anymore, of that being the reason they had only spoken over the phone in the last months and Luke still hadn’t come to see him in L.A. He’d intended to give Luke the time to grief, but what if he was past that initial stage now and had found out life without Noah was just fine?  
  
  
He’d almost forgotten he wasn’t alone by the time the Doctor showed up behind him. Luke and Ethan had left and gone back to the farm at that point, while Noah had been caught in his thoughts despite himself.  
  
“I don’t mean to interrupt this probably very emotional moment of self-discovery and what have you,” the Doctor said, with an impatience that came through in his voice, “but you kind of disappointed me, Noah Mayer. I give you all of time and space to choose from, and you don’t even cross an ocean. Of course, I am not denying the significance of this place, but I would say you didn’t need the TARDIS to get here.”  
  
“I think I did, really.”  
  
Just that one push in the right direction, that one moment to do something on an impulse, nothing planned. He didn’t have the time to worry about travel expenses or postponing appointments. Eliminating all those excuses, it was remarkably simple where he wanted to be if he could choose ‘any place, anywhere’.  
  
Then he realized the Doctor’s words. ‘All of time and space’. “Wait – all of  _time_?”  
  
“Time and Relative Dimension in Space,” the Doctor cheerfully announced, proudly waving at the TARDIS. “Yes, she does time travel as well. Does this mean you’ve changed your mind? Because I’m sure we can arrange a second trip, if you insist of course.”  
  
Noah smiled nervously. “You seem awfully set on taking someone with you.”  
  
“Yes, well, what is all of time and space if there’s no-one around to look impressed?”  
  
Noah laughed out loud at that. “Okay, I’ll take that. I, eh.” He did have one wish, though he had no idea how much of a disillusion it might turn out to be. Oh, what the hell. “Actually, there is something…”  
  
“I’ve heard enough. Come along, Mayer!” He snapped his fingers. “No, not quite the same ring to it, but it’ll do. All of time and space, coming right up!”  
  
  
When Noah left the TARDIS again, he stepped into a world he was surprisingly familiar with – except he wasn’t used to seeing it in color.  
  
He still hadn’t entirely decided whether the Doctor was just playing a very elaborate joke on him or if he was actually here in the past. Space travel was possible, but time travel… at any rate, it didn’t matter, not really. The experience was real.  
  
If he had to guess, Noah would place the era somewhere around the late 1940s, almost exactly as he’d seen it in the movies. The dressing styles, the people, the buildings – it all matched up. He was back in Los Angeles, except it was about fifty years before he was even born. It was still bustling with people, all moving very purposefully, looking straight ahead instead of down into their cell phones. That was a definite change.  
  
It took him a while to realize it was all too picture-perfect,  _too much_  like in the movies. It dawned upon him when someone bumped into him quite violently, quickly followed by an angry ‘and cut!’ somewhere nearby. The cameras were also sort of a giveaway, now that he was close enough to notice them.  
  
“Can someone get these two off the set, please?”  
  
Noah was seized by his shoulders and pushed aside forcefully, only to be quickly joined by the Doctor, who was stealing a glance behind them to make sure the TARDIS was out of view. Since it was parked just around the corner, it should be fine. In fact, it looked suspiciously much like the street corner Noah had first spotted the TARDIS in. Some things never changed.  
  
Now that they were out of sight for the cameras, people didn’t pay much attention to them anymore. Whatever this project was, they seemed in a rush to finish it, no distractions allowed to interfere with the schedule. Noah could relate.  
  
He was looking around to find clues, actors he might recognize. The Doctor played it straight as he just asked someone nearby for their newspaper.  
  
“I think we might be a couple of years off,” he said, showing Noah the date. “It’s not the 1950s yet.”  
  
“They still make movies,” Noah said. “I wasn’t set on a certain year, just on a certain era.”  
  
“Really?” The Doctor seemed honestly surprised. “That’s fortunate, then. How many decades are inspiring your work, in that case? And before you ask, yes, I did look at your bag. You threw it in a corner when you entered the TARDIS and it opened, so I took a peek. Natural curiosity got the best of me, it happens.”  
  
Considering Noah was technically hitchhiking along to get his wishes granted, he decided to let that one slide. “Well, you’re right.”  
  
“Excellent!” The Doctor clapped his hands. “Well, why don’t you meddle in here, do some research?”  
  
“Excuse me?”  
  
“What else are we here for?”  
  
Noah just stared at him incredulously. “Listen, I don’t know much about time travel, but I’m fairly sure I’m not meant to intervene with the past.” It should probably surprise him how easily he was carried along with this, but then again – crazy things just happened to him every once in a while. They mostly tended to include Luke, however.  
  
“Technically, simply our presence here is already intervening with the past,” the Doctor said, softly enough for him to hear without others listening into their conversation. He still managed to rattle on. “However, when we’re being even more technical, some events are fixed points in time that can’t be interfered with no matter what you try. But if you take any other given moment in time, such as this, you can change things, and time will wrap itself around it.”  
  
“This is not a fixed point in time?” Something seemed definitely off about that. This movie would end up being shown to others, years into the future. That seemed pretty fixed to Noah.  
  
“Noah Mayer, though movies may mean a lot to you, that doesn’t mean they are equally important in the space-time continuum. Now stay right here, let me see what I can do.”  
  
Before Noah could say another word, the Doctor left to talk to the person he most likely considered to be the director and flashed him some kind of note that apparently had some pretty impressive information on it, judging by said director’s reaction.  
  
Noah didn’t have the least trouble in keeping himself occupied in the mean while. As long as he kept a respecting distance from the actual filming, people mostly didn’t seem to mind him being around or watching the scenes being played out. And as he did the latter, he realized he’d already seen most of these scenes. They had just been slightly different and in black and white.  
  
Noah owned this movie on DVD. He hadn’t watched it in a while, and he wasn’t even sure where he’d left it, but that had more to do with a lack of time than with not wanting to see it. It wasn’t very well-known; it hadn’t won major prizes, and none of the actors were very famous either. In short, Noah hadn’t expected to ever see it on DVD, but when he had, he’d ordered it right away.  _Rain in the dark_. One of the main characters was blind, which also helped to explain why Noah hadn’t seen it in a while even after regaining his eyesight.  
  
And now he was watching as it was being shot.  
  
He’d barely processed it when the Doctor returned to his side, sporting his widest grin.  
  
“If you hurry up and put on something decent, you can be an extra in the next takes,” he announced, patting Noah on his shoulder.  
  
“What in the world did you tell them?”  
  
“Let’s see – ‘terribly important casting director with impeccable skills in casting extras that every director should definitely listen to’. Well, not literally, but it’s the gist of it, anyway.” He briefly flashed the piece of paper he’d shown the director before, allowing Noah a quick glance at almost those exact words before he put it away. “Now, go change your shirt or something, you’re a walking anachronism.”  
  
Noah just looked at the Doctor’s own attire and kept his comment to himself. “Fine, but I don’t have…”  
  
“Not to worry, there’s a wardrobe.”  
  
“Where?”  
  
The Doctor rolled his eyes. “Inside the TARDIS.”  
  
Of course there was.  
  
  
Half an hour after Noah first tumbled into the past, he was made a part of it, even if it was just a very small part.  
  
He’d eventually found a time-appropriate suit in the wardrobe, which was full of a lot of clothes he hoped the Doctor hadn’t worn himself, no matter how gorgeous some of those period dresses might be. There had also been a  _lot_ of hats.  
  
All he had to do was walking by in the background for the next takes, together with about a dozen other people. Odds were that he probably didn’t end up in the final movie at all, let alone that someone would notice him, but it didn’t matter. One lesson he’d long since learnt was that it was the experience that mattered, not necessarily the outcome, even if it hurt to acknowledge that sometimes.  
  
Plus, he wasn’t exactly the world’s best actor. He was more at ease behind the camera, but since there was no way that was going to happen, this was the best solution.  
  
The Doctor seemed ridiculously excited about it all the same and gave him thumbs up and another wide grin after the final take.  
  
“Don’t pretend as if that was much of an accomplishment,” Noah told him as soon as he was able to leave the set again. “I just did what we’ve been doing since we got here.”  
  
“Except it got caught on tape this time.”  
  
“I doubt I’ll even be in the picture. I’d say I would have spotted myself on my copy.”  
  
“Really? Because that’s what you generally do, looking for yourself in the background of movies that were made before you were born?” The Doctor was fully aware he had a point, judging by his smug look. “I would advise you to look up this scene again, you might be surprised.”  
  
“Do you know more about this?” Noah now asked, curious. “You’re a time traveler, so…”  _He could know so many things_ , he suddenly thought.  
  
“Yes, but for someone who travels through time, I have precious little of it to watch movies,” the Doctor said. “You won’t believe how many more will be made over the years that I would love to see. But, you know, there are always planets to save, civilizations to rescue, things like that. Mostly involving a lot more running than today.” He coughed. “Basically, this is a day off for me.”  
  
“You’re still traveling in time.”  
  
“Everyone is always traveling,” the Doctor countered. “So were you, before you got here. The only difference is that you normally don’t get to decide where you go to in the timeline, but you’re always traveling into the future. Surely, this is the past, but right now, it’s also your future, and it’s yours to shape.” He patted Noah on the shoulder. “Basically, stop worrying and enjoy.”  
  
  
Enjoying himself wasn’t really the problem. Now that he wasn’t needed anymore to fill in the backgrounds, Noah was allowed to linger about and observe the process of movie making some fifty years in the past. It might technically count as work, but it didn’t feel like it in the slightest. This may however be the most fun he’d had in months when it came to something work related. He tried not to think to hard about the last time he was having fun in general.  
  
Still, time was ticking.  
  
Of course, the Doctor had reassured him he could bring him back at any given point in time he wanted – as long as he didn’t interfere with his own timeline, because two Noahs at the same time might be hard to explain. It still felt as if he should be going back soon.  
  
And no matter how much he enjoyed himself, no matter how much this was still a dream coming true, he  _wanted_ to go back. His first trip with the Doctor had stuck with him.  
  
“Already?” the Doctor said when he voiced his wish, sounding deeply disappointed. “Isn’t there anything else you’d like to see?”  
  
“Yes, but…” He shrugged. “There’s  _someone_ I’d like to see, and he isn’t here.”  
  
“Ah!” The Doctor pointed his finger at him. “The little boy or the tall one?”  
  
“His name’s Luke,” Noah said. It still surprised him how many emotions were attached to his name, and then again, it shouldn’t surprise him at all. “The little boy is his brother, Ethan.”  
  
“And who is Luke, if you want to see him and you didn’t go to him when you had the chance?”  
  
Either the Doctor had him all figured out and just needed him to say the words out loud, or he really was morbidly curious on top of observant. Or both. “He’s…” My ex? Somehow, that didn’t sound quite right. ‘My boyfriend’ was off-limits; he couldn’t claim that, not anymore. “No-one in particular,” he tried, knowing instantly that it wasn’t the right word either. If there was one word that didn’t describe Luke, it would be ‘no-one’.  
  
The Doctor agreed with his thoughts. “No-one? I’ve never met a no-one. Everyone always turns out to be a somebody. Don’t try and fool me, Mayer. He’s somebody to you.”  
  
“Fine. Yes, he is.” He sighed. “It’s just, things happened, and… I said I would wait for him. I’m not going to force him to see me if he isn’t ready. It’s just that… it’s been a while.”  
  
“So you want to return to the time and place I found you to wait a little longer,” the Doctor said, sounding exasperated. “That could be arranged, of course. If that’s what you really want.”  
  
It wasn’t, not really, but it was the best he could do for now. He wanted so much more than that, but he knew that this wasn’t the time yet. “Yes,” he thus said.  
  
  
The Doctor fulfilled his promise: the TARDIS landed at the exact same spot as it had done twice before, except it was in Noah’s present this time. There was no movie being shot, the cars that passed him in the streets had been made in the twenty-first century, and people were walking around looking down at their cell phones.  
  
The Doctor walked ahead while Noah lingered in front of the TARDIS, slightly baffled by everything that had happened since he’d last set foot here in this age. It had been much easier to go along with the Doctor and his ideas as they were still travelling, but now he was back in the reality of his life. A reality he’d have to face sooner or later.  _People_ he’d have to face sooner or later.  
  
When Noah took out his cell phone, he found it was still looking for a connection, probably recovering from the travel back in time.  
  
One minute later, the missed calls started rolling in. Ten, twenty, thirty, fifty. What the…  
  
“Doctor?”


	2. Death of a star

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Spacey-wacey rambling and aliens ahead; this is where the warnings come into play. I do apologize.

Luke was staying at the Snyder farm for the summer, taking care of his work for his foundation and the hospital wing from here. He could spend time with his family, and he was guaranteed to be distracted the entire day. He needed that. If he was left alone with his own thoughts, they wandered off and left him pondering if he was doing the right thing and if maybe, possibly, he didn’t have some place else to be.

Of course he did, that was exactly the problem.

The Snyder pond had become a place of conflicting feelings for Luke now, but he still went there every day, if only for a little while. He’d said goodbye to Reid here, almost two years ago now. The memories from the years before tended to be happier, but they also tended to involve someone else.

Noah had known to find him here. They’d been here together often, going all the way back to that first time swimming together to ‘cool down’, except it had accomplished exactly the opposite.

Luke had been mourning someone else, but that hadn’t stopped him from missing Noah so much that it physically ached. That feeling had been growing stronger over the last couple of months, fed whenever Noah called or showed up like he had for the holiday season. Still, they hadn’t talked all that lot; Noah had been there as much for the rest of the family as Luke had himself.

Noah had spent quite some time with Ethan, who was overjoyed to have him around again and babbled on and on about his new adventures at school. Ethan was still a little bundle of chaos; just yesterday, Luke had to chase him to the pond to save him from a dive in the water. His little brother surely knew how to give him a fright. It was lovely weather, however, so he didn’t blame him at all for wanting to be outside. In fact, he may just follow that example today.

 

While he was gathering his laptop and additional USB sticks and disks to take outside, he found a small pile of DVDs he didn’t remember getting himself. A short glossing over the covers told him why he didn’t remember them – they were Noah’s. He must have left them here, forgotten about them somehow, though that was a bit hard to imagine considering how careful he was with his movies.

Curiosity made Luke skim the titles again. Rain in the dark stood out to him with its title and dark cover, and after reading its backside, it quickly became obvious why Noah might not have wanted to see this movie for a while. One of the storylines involved a blind character. Luke added it to his pile to take outside without thinking too much about it.

 

Oh, what the hell. He had never heard Noah about this particular movie as far as he remembered, and he was curious now. He’d been unable to not think about Noah anyway, and this might just be a way to feel a bit closer to him again.

So after he’d installed himself near the Snyder pond, Luke put the DVD in his laptop and clicked ‘play’.

To his surprise, he was actually sort of captivated by the movie. It didn’t absorb him completely, but he was interested enough to keep watching to find out what would happen. Sometimes, the pacing was rather slow, and he found himself drifting off as Noah had accused him of doing many times before. At such moments, he was just staring at the screen, not really absorbing what was going on.

It was during one of those moments that he spotted someone in the background, somewhere after the first hour.

He wasn’t even paying particular attention to the actors, let alone extras in the background, but there was one person who would always stand out to him, even if just by the way he walked.

Luke paused the movie, rewound it to the exact point, paused it and squinted at the screen. Rationally, he knew he had to be mistaken, that it wasn’t possible to see anyone he knew in a movie that was made far before he was born. The most logical explanations were that either he was going crazy, or his subconscious was truly seeking out Noah wherever it could.

But it was Noah, no doubt about it. How he got there was a whole other discussion. Maybe he’d manipulated himself into the movie, but that wouldn’t explain the official-looking disk. Maybe it was just someone who looked and walked suspiciously much like him, to the point of looking identical.

Within minutes, Luke had forgotten about the movie itself, and even about the work he’d planned to do outside. He was taking screenshots instead, comparing them to the pictures of Noah he still had on his laptop just to make sure.

It was too much of a coincidence. This was a DVD Noah had owned, had left at Luke’s place as if for someone to find. One of the characters had gone blind in an accident and was trying to cope. And then Noah himself had appeared in the background. How was he not supposed to read into this, see things?

It wasn’t until a strange noise distracted him that he looked up from his laptop. He’d heard it before, yesterday in fact, as he’d been down here at the pond with Ethan. Then, it had sounded like cars driving by in the distance or something else on the road, but it was much closer this time and most definitely not a car.

Luke carefully put his laptop in the grass before he got up, determined to find the source of the noise this time.

That wasn’t going to be very hard. In a matter of seconds, the noise had become more persistent and closer, alarmingly close. As the grass started to tremble in a sudden gust of wind, Luke looked up, half-expecting a helicopter hovering above him. The sky was empty, however, slightly spotted with small clouds.

His eyes were immediately drawn back to the ground once something solid was taking shape mere feet away from him. One moment, there was an empty patch of grass; the next, the first pale outlines were getting visible, only to make place for a very solid police box in a matter of seconds.

Luke felt a strange surge of relief: he was just dreaming, that had to be it.

Unfortunately for Luke, he didn’t have a lot of time to enjoy that revelation. The door of the box was opening, and the man who stepped out made him quickly reconsider his dream theory. If he truly was dreaming this up, Luke would probably not have dreamt of this stranger.

He was, lacking a better word, peculiar. Tweed jackets weren’t exactly all the rage, and Luke hadn’t seen many people wearing a bowtie lately, much less a dark red one. Not exactly the kind of man Luke would fantasize about dropping out of thin air in a box, in short.

The man was looking around, as if just to check where he’d landed himself, before he shook his head to himself. “What is it with this place… Oh, hello there,” he then said quite merrily, directing himself to Luke, who was staring at him with what he imagined wasn’t a very flattering expression of surprise on his face. “Well, that was quite the landing, all but hit the water this time, I see. You could not possibly pretend you didn’t see that, could you?”

“You just…” Luke was trying his best to search for the words as he was internally freaking the hell out. “You just appeared out of nowhere in a police box! How the hell am I supposed to not have seen this?! Seriously, a blue box!”

“Oh, yes. Well. I thought we’d just gone over this before, pardon me. The chameleon circuit, it’s a little…” The man made a couple of gestures that didn’t mean anything to Luke before he gave up. “So, how have you been?” he then asked, still sounding as cheerful as when he first stepped out.

“Good. Fine. Perfect.” Luke was slightly hysterical at this point. “Boxes and people just popping up right in front of me, business as usual.”

“Oh, I see! Oh, right, right. Of course, excuse me.” The man clapped his hands. “Right. Well, it’s good to meet you, a bit unexpected as it may be. I am the Doctor.”

That was the last drop. “Is this some kind of sick joke?” Luke said, and so what if his voice raised an octave or so. “Here at the pond, a doctor appearing out of nowhere?”

“No, not a joke! It’s who I am, the Doctor. I’m sorry if that offends you in any way.” It was the first time his cheerfulness disappeared, and he slightly bowed his head as if to apologize.

“It’s just…” Luke shook his head, unable to deal with this now. “No, never mind that. What just happened?”

“TARDIS got a little excited,” the Doctor said, glancing over his shoulder at the box, “so I tried landing here. All but missed the pond while I did, she seems awfully drawn to it.” He tapped the box now, gently, almost affectionately. “Good old girl she is, but a bit stubborn at times. I was just on my way to see some old friends in Egypt, but I suppose they will have to wait.”

‘TARDIS’ was probably the easiest to understand in that sentence, as it was quite obvious he meant the police box by that. “You travel in that?”

“Bit slow, aren’t you?” the Doctor simply said.

“Yes, well, excuse me for not immediately catching on when someone just lands at my feet in a police box.”

The Doctor gave him a wide grin. “Feeling a little sarcastic today?”

“Will you stop doing that?” He felt like stamping his foot to make a point, if that hadn’t been a bit too childish even for Luke. “Look, I was just sitting here, this is my family’s place, okay? I don’t know what you think you’re doing, but I am ten seconds away from calling the police. I don’t care how you got here.” Okay, so maybe that wasn’t the most mature approach either, but he was freaking out. He thought he was quite allowed to be freaked out by all of this, thank you very much.

“That’s a bit rude, seeing as how I just stepped out of a police box,” the Doctor said, clearly mocking Luke’s earlier shouts. “And honestly, I truly doubt you will call anyone.”

“Oh, you doubt it?”

“Yes, because regardless of your rather passionate denial, you do seem awfully interested in how I got here.” The Doctor turned away from him and went back to the TARDIS, as the box was apparently called. “Well, I suppose I could always just show you.”

With those words, he pushed open the door, giving Luke a glimpse of what was inside. It was much brighter than Luke would expect from such a small place - maybe he’d put up some lamps?

“Don’t tell me you’re not curious,” the Doctor said, and that was the last drop.

“Fine.” He might as well get it over with. Just a look inside, nod, and back away slowly before figuring out his next step.

That was the plan, anyway. Then the Doctor moved away from the door, giving Luke a plain view on the inside.

Bright it was – there was a kind of orange glow coming from the suddenly impossibly large interior. Three steps closer, and he was on the doorstep, on the brink between reality and the impossible. He didn’t know where to look first as he took the final step to enter, something he hadn’t been planning at all.

It was a home inside a police box. More than a home, though he couldn’t quite put his finger on the air it was giving off. It was like something – someone – was reaching out to him, curious. And amidst of all that, there was the unmistakable feeling of very advanced technology.

“You have a space ship and it looks like a police box,” Luke eventually concluded, most of his breath taken away by surprise.

“You’re not even going to see it’s bigger on the inside?” the Doctor said, sounding both amused and slightly disappointed. He entered now too to join Luke.

“Yeah, well, that seemed kind of obvious.” He faced the Doctor directly now. “But seriously? It’s really a space ship, no jokes?”

“For space and time travel, more accurately,” the Doctor said, “but yes. So, I take it you’re still not curious at all, not in the slightest?”

“Oh, just shut up.” Now that the initial shock and surprise were wearing off, excitement was slowly taking over.

The Doctor simply grinned, visibly pleased with that answer. “How about I show you how she works? You’ve already seen a landing, so maybe you could experience one.”

Luke raised his eyebrow. “What, you often take random people with you in your space and time ship?”

“From time to time,” the Doctor admitted, “traveling alone can get a bit boring, if you must know. So, is that a yes?”

 

Luke had never been much of the ‘think before you act’ type, and so, he’d rushed back to the farm to pack his bag within minutes. His mind was racing, considering the possibilities. He’d seen the box appearing out of nowhere, he’d seen it from the inside. ‘Space and time ship’ honestly didn’t sound so farfetched anymore.

He’d half expected the Doctor and the TARDIS to be gone by the time he got back, just a trick of the mind after all. It was probably too good to be true anyway. Maybe it had been another kind of trick, consisting of the Doctor telling him to pack his things while he made his grand escape, never to be seen again.

None of all that. Instead, the Doctor was patiently waiting for Luke, leaning against the wall of the TARDIS and looking out over the Snyder pond.

“I can see the appeal of this place,” he said, half to Luke, half to himself. “Well, off we go, then. Any ideas for where you would like to go?”

“What are my choices?”

“Anywhere you want.”

He didn’t even question him. If a police box could travel through space and time, surely it wouldn’t be picky about what space and time exactly. “Surprise me, then.”

 

With a lot of noises, the TARDIS eventually came to rest.

“Go on then, take a look,” the Doctor urged him, pushing Luke towards the door. He sounded as excited as Luke felt, though he didn’t dare to show it yet. It could still be a joke, after all.

Once he’d opened the TARDIS door, it was to a surprisingly familiar scenery, even though Luke was also instantly sure it wasn’t planet Earth anymore. There was no wind, for starters, not even the slightest breeze. The TARDIS had blown away some of the sand around them, but there was no sign of movement elsewhere. The silence was deafening, and the dark night somehow made the quiet more pressing. The world around them was a desert, stretching out as far as the eye could see.

He still knew this place, for the simple reason he’d seen photos of it. Except on those pictures, there had mostly been an American flag featured prominently in the background.

The ultimate give-away was the big blue marble in the sky. Luke smiled to himself.

“Should we be able to breathe here without one of those white suits?” Luke asked over his shoulder.

“As long as you stay in or close to the TARDIS, you’re fine,” the Doctor said. He was leaning on the console, not even attempting to make his way to the door. “Are you saying you know where we are?”

“The moon, isn’t it?” Luke said. He surprised himself with the calm in his voice as he said that – sure, he landed on the moon every other day, no big deal. Then again, he’d had stranger things happening to him. “We’re not exactly the first to get here.”

“Not in the slightest,” the Doctor admitted with a grin. “It’s still definitely worth a visit. Do you want to check out Armstrong’s footprints? They should still be there due to the lack of atmosphere, unless the TARDIS made too much of a mess the other time. You can build sand castles bigger than yourself and they won’t ever fall over!”

The Doctor sounded a bit too excited about moon sand castles and footprints from the past to Luke’s comfort. Luke himself felt strangely disappointed.

“That’s just the thing, isn’t it?” he said. “Others were here before. Don’t get me wrong, but I was expecting something a little more… unique, so to say, if you have the choice of everything that ever happened anywhere in the universe. You boast about it and then you take me to the moon. Isn’t that the biggest cliché?”

“Something more unique, then?” The Doctor sounded just a little agitated. “I’ll have you know that there aren’t many moons this big compared to their mother planet, and the fact that it is the first extraterrestrial surface humans officially ever set foot on makes it rather unique to begin with. But I see this doesn’t interest you, as you’ve seen photos of it and you can see it in the night sky yourself, isn’t that it?”

“Well, excuse me for expecting something a little further away than the freaking moon!”

“Fine.” The Doctor had less trouble pulling himself together than Luke had. That, or he was just very easily distracted. “Something unique and something far away. I think I know just the place, in that case.” He smiled to himself, visibly pleased. “I’ve been wanting to go there for a while myself, so I might as well take you with me, even though quite frankly, you don’t really deserve it.”

With those words, he turned back to the console, dancing around and smashing buttons, as well as the keys on what looked suspiciously much like a typewriter keyboard.

Luke in the mean while was still standing in the opening of the door, looking out over the rocky surface. Sure, it wasn’t exactly deep space, but once he’d gotten over that, some of his initial excitement returned. There was some other-worldly beauty about this place, there was no denying that. The silence, the realization that the blue ball in the sky was actually his home. It got him thinking.

So okay, maybe upsetting the person who was his ticket back to Earth wasn’t the best of plans. And maybe he didn’t really deserve another trip if he couldn’t appreciate this view. He felt there was some kind of life lesson in it that he’d rather pretend he didn’t notice for now; he had enough life lessons to catch up on.

Normal life seemed suddenly very far away, not only in the most literal sense.

“Ready to shut the door?” the Doctor now asked, his hand hovering over the last buttons.

“Just one moment.” Luke took a deep breath of technically non-existent air as he threw one last look at planet Earth. So small, and yet so very big. You never noticed the Earth was round when you had your feet planted in its soil. There was so much going on up there, and you would never say so as you looked from the moon. It all seemed to peaceful.

With those thoughts fresh in mind, Luke closed the door. “Yeah, I’m ready.”

 

Before Luke had the chance to open the door after landing, the Doctor stopped him in his tracks. “Be prepared, as it may be very hot outside,” he warned him. “If my guess is correct, and it usually is, unless I’m proven wrong… at any rate, we should now be on a planet so unknown that the star it’s orbiting doesn’t even have an official name. I hope that’s unique enough for you.”

Ouch. Well, he had that one coming. “No-one knows it exists?”

“And even better, no-one’s ever set foot on it before. With good reason, of course, but that is just a minor detail in your grander scheme of things, I would say.”

“Hold a minute.” Luke backed away from the door completely. “What is out there, anyway?”

“Go take a look.”

“If people have good reason to stay away, I’d like to know that reason first.”

“It’s easier to just see it for yourself,” the Doctor said, reaching to open the door. “Don’t worry, it’s not dangerous – not all that very much.”

“Can’t you just tell…”

Before Luke had any chance to finish that sentence, the Doctor had opened the door and pushed him out in one fluid movement. “I’ll be with you in a second.”

 

The first thing he noticed was that it was very hot indeed, desert-like. The fact he’d stepped out onto sand plains only added to that feeling. The skies above him were red as if someone had set fire to them.

Almost immediately after that, Luke caught sight of the sun – or rather, what could pass as the sun if you squinted and pretended really hard. It was mostly a bright, red light beaming through the clouds, and still vaguely recognizable as round. It was setting, and judging by its enormous size, it was most likely the cause for the heat. Luke had to look away from it even quicker than from the sun he was used to back on Earth.

“Don’t inhale too deeply,” the Doctor said behind him. “It’s probably not a good idea to stay around here for weeks on end, but you should be alright for a little while at least, even as a human.”

Luke turned to him to ask something, but he promptly forgot his question when he saw the Doctor. “You went back to get a hat?”

“A Stetson, mind you. Stetsons are cool,” the Doctor clarified. “I figured, American, hot planet, need a hat, what the hell. Can I interest you in one?”

Luke snorted. “No, thank you.”

“Your loss. Well, you should still put on some sunglasses to protect your eyes when the clouds part. Here.”

Luke was only partially surprised when the sunglasses he was handed were his own. The only reason he’d remembered to take sunglasses at all was because he’d figured his next trip anywhere would be to L.A. He’d just taken his pre-packed bag. Well, so much for that trip. “You went through my stuff.” He shook his head. “You don’t even know my name and you just go through my stuff.”

“Oh, I do know - you’re Luke Snyder,” the Doctor simply said, ignoring the whole invasion-of-privacy implication. “And that was written on the label on your bag, by the way. No browsing through secret diaries involved.”

Luke did not remember labeling his bag, but he decided not to argue. “You look in my bag, I hitchhike along in your space-time ship. Seems fair.”

“My thoughts exactly.” The Doctor practically danced around his ash now, eager to show off this new world. “So, what do you think? Something different, isn’t it?”

“Absolutely.” Luke looked around some more, trying to take in the environment. Most of it was what you could expect from a desert-like planet. A lot of sand, not a living thing in sight – not even a dried out tree to fulfill the cliché. Somewhere in the distance, he spotted what resembled a rocky hill. “What are we here for, anyway? You wanted to go here yourself, right?”

“Right. You see that star over there?” He pointed at what Luke had called the sun earlier, and was frankly pretty hard to miss. Luke nodded anyway.

“It’s dying. It used to be the size of your sun, but it’s now a red giant in the last stage of its life. We’re standing on one of its planet, the second out of the three in its planetary system. It used to be frozen over completely, simply by its sheer distance from its sun. Look at it now!” He spread his arms towards the scenery. “And this is just the front seat for the main show. The first planet is much closer to its star, meaning it is scorching at this point, and it will be swallowed by the giant somewhere tomorrow morning.”

It really hadn’t taken long for Luke to find out the Doctor was the kind of person who made him raise his eyebrow every other minute. “How do you even know all this?”

“I’m a Time Lord.” He raised his finger to make his point. “Some people might say that doesn’t necessarily mean I know what I’m doing, but I beg to differ. I mostly know what I’m doing.”

Time Lord. Yeah, okay, Luke was officially not trying to make sense of anything the Doctor was saying anymore. “Fine. So, tomorrow then?” A planet swallowed by its sun – it sounded so bizarre Luke was having trouble picturing it as something real and not something from the movies.

“At dawn, more precisely. You can only see an inferior planet when the sun is setting or rising. In fact, it should be in the sky in a matter of minutes…” With his hand shielding his eyes, the Doctor looked around in the darkening red sky. “Not yet, but it won’t be long. It’s going to be bigger than you might think. Both planets have been thrown from their original orbit when the star expanded, but not enough to escape its influence. This planet should be safe for a couple of years to come, but to be honest with you, I’m not quite sure how long its years are at this point.”

Luke had tried to pay attention up to this point, but a scientific speech didn’t quite cut it for him if he could just look around instead. “You just pick people up to travel with you so you can bounce off your knowledge on them and look impressive, don’t you?”

“Caught me,” the Doctor cheerfully said, and he might just mean it, though it was hard to judge. “So, how about I shut up for a while and we wait for the night to fall? Then you get to see what makes this system so unique. It’s not the red giant, that happens to all sun-like stars eventually.”

Well, that was an uplifting message. Sure, the red giant looked impressive, but it meaning the end of the earth wasn’t the nicest mental image.

 

Waiting for the night to come didn’t take all that long objectively speaking, but it meant a lot of time to think. Luke had seated himself with his back against the TARDIS’ wall to keep in the shadows, and the Doctor had offered him a blanket to sit on. Seeing how the sand was still very hot with the sun down, that was a good idea, but Luke wasn’t so sure about the questionable flower pattern. It was probably best not to ask. The Doctor himself sat against the TARDIS’ other side, on an equally hideous blanket, most likely sunk away in his own thoughts, whatever they might be about.

The flowers on the blanket formed a sharp contrast against the rest of this world. Everything was dying. The planet itself, with its barren land and occasional rock formations, was breathing its last. Its sun was bleeding into its skies. Yet here they were, two people stranded, next to the blue box that had brought them here.

Death had been close to Luke before. It had been close to himself personally, and it had been the invisible force taking people he cared for away from him. This time, it was all around him, and he had the ominous feeling it was encircling him like an upcoming threat.

Something else attributed to that gloomy feeling, though he couldn’t quite define this ‘something’ at first.

He’d been looking at the sky for a while, watching the sky darken into ever darker shades of red before turning completely black. Some vague blobs had appeared in the sky; some were round dots, some were flattened into strokes. There were a few dozen of them in various seizes; they looked like a painter had tried out different strokes with his new brush in the night sky. He was reminded at night times at the pond, when the sky had been clear enough to see the stars, except something was off this time.

“Huh.”

The Doctor moved slightly next to him. “Something wrong?”

“Shouldn’t we be seeing more stars?” Luke asked. “I mean, there were a lot more in the sky over the pond.”

“Oh, but those lights you see aren’t stars,” the Doctor said. “Or rather, they are – just very, very many of them, all at once. What you’re seeing are entire galaxies. You need to be in a galaxy yourself to see individual stars, or they simply won’t be close enough. This, Luke Snyder,” he continued with a slightly raised voice, “is a dying solar system, tossed out of its galaxy billions of years ago, before it may have even had planets. By all accounts, it shouldn’t exist, and yet here we are.”

“Eh…” The Doctor was obviously expecting him to be impressed. “Wow?”

That resulted in a deep sigh next to him. “Yes, that was my big reveal of the night, thank you. Tell me something, just how impressive is that little town of yours that the moon and an isolated solar system deserve nothing but a hesitant ‘wow’ at best?”

“It’s not the town itself per say,” Luke said before he could help himself.

The Doctor simply sighed again. “Oh, you humans.” He didn’t sound judgmental, rather almost… nostalgic.

At any rate, Luke didn’t quite know how to respond. Heck, he didn’t even really know what he’d meant himself, though he had the suspicion it was related to those night times at the Snyder pond. He was the one being nostalgic today, and it wasn’t for the deceased.

There was a short silence, and in those moment, something appeared in the distance that was about to overthrow that night. “Doctor?” Damn, the word alone still sounded so strange. “Is that a light over there? Near those rocks?”

“That’s not possible.”

“This whole place was impossible, wasn’t it?” Luke countered. “Can’t you at least look before you dismiss it?”

It was definitely a light, and it was moving towards them at that, swinging slightly above the ground as if someone was carrying it.

The Doctor had gotten up to take the step over to Luke’s side, and he took a couple of seconds before he reacted to the sight in a rather pointed way. “Who is there?” he then called out, as if it was the most rational thing to do on a planet that was not supposed to have life. He seemed to realize it made no sense to Luke, because he quickly turned to him. “Asking is mostly the quickest option. However, when they start shooting something at you, I suggest getting back into the TARDIS is your best bet.”

Then, somewhere in the dark, a voice echoed through the night in response, muffled by the distance but still quite clear. “Hello?”

It was definitely English, but Luke wasn’t so sure if it was human. It sounded like a child’s voice, but it had such a raw edge to it he instinctively backed away. “Are you sure this was a good idea?”

“Absolutely positive!” The Doctor enthusiastically waved and to Luke’s utter surprise, the light waved back at him by swinging back and forth. “Hello, over here!”

The soft pitter-patter of tiny feet rapidly approached them, and soon enough, Luke was blinking into the light he’d spotted.

“Sorry,” the same voice as before said, and the light was put down on the sand. It was a tiny lantern as far as Luke could judge, seeing as it was too bright to look straight into it. The lantern wasn’t exactly the most interesting thing to see.

Maybe it had been a bit naïve to think they’d bump into humans here, but Luke hadn’t exactly been expecting lizards, either. There were three of them, one a bit taller than the other two, but all around four to five feet long if you didn’t include their long tails. They were on all fours, and as such, barely reaching Luke’s knees. And all of them were looking up curiously to the Doctor and Luke, with such an intelligent look in their eyes that it was slightly unnerving.

“Rapotalis! Oh, you’re lovely!” the Doctor exclaimed, positively delighted. “Excuse me, Luke, these are rapotales. I’m the Doctor, this here is Luke.” He squatted down to get on eyelevel with the lizards and stretched out his finger. “Good to meet you, very good. Bit of an odd place to meet one another, don’t you think?”

“This is not our home, as you know,” the first lizard said. It was leaning back on its tail so that it became bipedal, and it stretched out its foot to touch the Doctor’s finger. It took a short hold of him with its paw that looked more like a human hand than expected with a lizard. It even had a opposable thumb. “But neither is it yours.”

“Just tourists passing by,” the Doctor said with a smile. “How about you?”

“We had an accident,” the first lizard said, apparently speaking for the three of them. “We had no idea this planet was here. We were lucky to escape the pull of its star.”

One of the other two lizards was looking around nervously, and softly nudged the first one as it nodded into the direction they’d come from. “The others are coming this way, Bao. They must be concerned.”

“I see. There is nothing to be concerned about, but let them come,” the first lizard said, apparently called Bao. He directed himself at the Doctor again. “I imagine we have a lot of things we can talk about.”

“Most certainly,” the Doctor agreed, before he took off his Stetson. “And my apologies, I don’t believe we have properly introduced ourselves. I am the Doctor, and this here is Luke Snyder of Earth.”

Luke eyed him – why would he mention Earth so explicitly in only his case?

“Good to meet you. My name is Bao,” the first lizard said, confirming Luke’s suspicions. “I’m the temporary head of two of our clans. We have lost many of our numbers during our journey and our stay here, so there are only nine of us left. The other six are on their way.”

He didn’t introduce the other two, but the one that hadn’t spoken up yet was still staring at Luke, who was feeling pretty uncomfortable by now. “Ehm, hi?”

“Hi,” the creature said, completely unabashed that it was caught staring. “I’m Nez.”

Luke laughed despite himself. At least that was shorter than its species name, which had already slipped his mind. “Oh, okay. Hi, Nez.”

“Hi, Luke Snyder of Earth.” The creature’s face wrinkled in what could only be called a smile. “What brings you here?”

“The Doctor,” he said abruptly, which seemed like the only right answer. “And you?”

“Our spaceship,” Nez deadpanned.

Luke would have laughed again hadn’t Bao eyed Nez in a way that didn’t bode well. Nez kind of shied away, but he snuck up to Luke’s side and stayed there as they all waited for the rest to arrive.

At last, Luke spotted lights in the distance similar to the light that had alerted them before about these three. And indeed, they turned out to be lanterns in this case as well. Soon, there were six other lizards that stared at them, and the awkward silence lasted a good while before the Doctor broke it by clapping his hands once.

“Well, obviously I don’t mean to pry,” he said, “but if my calculations are correct, we are a long way from Selanzia, aren’t we?”

“Sel- what now?” Luke interrupted, which earned him some shaking heads and a sigh from Nez, who managed to roll his eyes as well.

“Selanzia, in the Twin Feather galaxy,” Bao said, clarifying absolutely nothing.

Nez caught up with Luke and rose to speak into his ear. “It’s where we’re from; a long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away.”

Luke gave him a confused look, but he couldn’t decide if Nez was being serious or actually intentionally quoting Star Wars. Really, he wouldn’t be surprised anymore if the latter was the case. He was kneeling next to a lizard in outer space, who was talking to him like he was his friend already. Quoting movies seemed like the next logical step even if said lizard couldn’t possibly have seen them.

It’s something Noah could have said. The thought crossed his mind so quickly that Luke wasn’t even sure if he’d just been thinking about Noah all along.

“We fled,” Bao now said. “Our planet was in danger, so several clans united and left Selanzia looking for a better place. We ended up on this unexpected planet, but our hopes of finding new life here were futile. This planet is facing destruction in a matter of years.” He looked rather troubled. “We would leave, but our ship is damaged beyond repair. Building a new one with the materials we can find here would simply take too much time.”

Luke didn’t know what to say to that, so he turned to the Doctor. The expression on his face was unreadable: something between torment and regret, but it was hard to tell exactly. He had something to hide, that much was for sure.

Wait a second. “You have a space ship, Doctor.”

Those six little words evoked quite some response. Nez looked up excited; some of his clan members started murmuring among themselves; Bao just looked at the Doctor, and the Doctor himself didn’t seem particularly amused.

“Are you offering my TARDIS without my consent, Snyder?”

“I just meant…”

“Does that mean we can go home?” Nez asked happily.

“Oh, dear.” The way the Doctor suddenly lowered his voice drew Luke’s attention to him. It was the first time there wasn’t a hint of a smile on his face anymore. “You don’t know, do you.”

Luke might have heard him, but Nez apparently hadn’t, or he just chose to ignore him. “See, Selanzia is our best bet,” he continued either way, “we know how to get back there.”

“We might survive,” Bao said, “while every day on this planet is little short of a miracle. It’s not just its star that is a constant threat.”

It took a moment for that message to sink in. “You mean you’re not alone out here?” the Doctor eventually asked, almost slowly compared to his usual pacing.

A silence fell after that. The creatures looked around, none of them wanting to be the one to answer that question definitely. The Doctor looked as if his mind was racing a million miles per hour, but if it was, he wasn’t sharing the outcome of his thoughts.

Nez had snuggled up close to Luke and reached out his paw - hand as if to seek comfort, and Luke took it without giving it much thought. He wasn’t sure what to think anymore, anyway. Watching a planet die had only been sort of fun knowing you could get out and no-one got hurt in the process.

The silence was eventually broken by Bao. “They call themselves the Fallen Ones,” he slowly said, “The Banished. The Kryshim.” He paused in between every term, as if each word made it all the worse. Judging by the Doctor’s face, it did.

“They are here? In this system?”

“Do you know them?” Luke asked.

“Better than anyone should ever wish to,” the Doctor grimly said. “And I think I have a rather good idea now why this star is dying before its time. Get back into the TARDIS, Luke. Now. We’re leaving.”

“What? No!” Nez was still holding him, and it felt much too familiar to let go of him now. “I’m not leaving them behind if it’s that dangerous here!”

“Fine!” The Doctor said with a snarl. “Fine, just drag them along if you must insist, but don’t say I didn’t try to warn you. Into the TARDIS then, in you go, chop chop.”

It was just a short walk back, seeing how the lizards had caught up with them so quickly after first spotting them. In theory, getting back inside should not be a problem at all.

In reality, something interfered with so much noise Luke was for one moment terrified into thinking the star had already exploded and everything was over. Two very loud stomping noises approached them, so heavily that the ground was shaking below their feet. Then, something reached through the darkness straight for the TARDIS itself.

It took another moment for Luke to see they were hands, and almost humanlike hands at that, if much bigger and hairier than any human hands he’d ever seen. Two pairs of them had seized the TARDIS on its sides, pulling it over to the point it was leaning back dangerously low to the ground.

“No!” It was the Doctor, though Luke barely recognized his voice now all of his calm surface was gone. He’d reached for something that looked like a screwdriver and was manically pressing on it. The screwdriver emitted some kind of laser beam, fully hitting one of the gigantic hands that held the TARDIS. It withdrew while its still unseen owner left out a bloodcurdling, low scream that sounded even less human than the lizards’ voices.

For a short moment, Luke was convinced this was going to be easy. The Doctor had some kind of weapon that obviously worked against whatever enemies they were facing. Surely he looked worried, but he knew what he was doing, right?

“Watch out!” It was Nez, who’d suddenly jumped out on him and tackled Luke to the ground.

“What are you…”

“Stay down!”

A bright flash lit the night sky then, so blinding that even with his eyes pressed shut, Luke still saw it just as clearly as if he’d opened his eyes. He felt Nez somewhere over his head, attempting to cover his face. Almost immediately, Luke was blown into the ground by a strong wave of sand rushing over them.

 

Everything was dark and silent. Luke instinctively reached for his eyes, only to discover Nez was covering them with his arm, at least explaining the darkness.

“Sorry,” Nez quickly said as he got off.

With his vision back, Luke just looked around, astounded by the sudden change in view. The TARDIS was gone, though a distinct dragging mark didn’t leave any mysteries as to what had happened to it. In between the former parking spot of the TARDIS and their company, there was a big crater that definitely hadn’t been there before. The sand had been blown away and had revealed the rocks underneath. Something must have exploded.

The Doctor was pretty close to him, lying in the sand with his head covered in protection. The eight other rapotales were curled up into balls, seemingly asleep, though some of them were stirring now. The crater was dangerously close to all of them, especially to Luke. Just a couple of inches closer and he wouldn’t be sitting here anymore.

Luke now focused on Nez incredulously. “Did you just… save my life?”

“I think so.” He seemed pretty smug about it, too. Something about this little alien reminded Luke suspiciously much of Ethan. If by some miracle he got out of this place alive, Luke could tell him – Ethan would probably be endlessly amused, he thought to himself with a smile.

Everyone seemed to recover now. Most of the rapotales had gotten up and were seeking each other out, making sure they were alright. One pair cupped each other’s head and put their foreheads together, and something about that made Luke turn his head away in embarrassment.

It was starting to sink in. The TARDIS had disappeared. It wasn’t just a strange blue box – it was Luke’s ticket home. They were stranded here, on a dying planet around a dying star. He had no way of going home. He had no way of knowing if Ethan would indeed be amused when he told him about Nez. No way of taking that one plane ride he’d had to make two years ago already.

His legs were suddenly too heavy to support him getting up.

 

The Doctor was sitting up now, but rather than at least relieved to be alive, he seemed exceptionally aggravated. He got to his feet remarkably quickly after being blown away and marched towards the spot the TARDIS had been in earlier. His screwdriver-like tool still in hand, he knelt down there, feeling the ground and pointing his screwdriver at the drag marks. He pressed on it again, though this time, it only made a buzzing sound.

Eventually, he shook his head to himself and got up, looking directly at Bao. Bao’d been eyeing him as curiously as Luke probably had.

“Tell me where they’re hiding,” the Doctor demanded of him.

Luke stared at him. “What, you’re just going to storm in? They almost killed us in an explosion just now!”

“I am a mad man with a box without my box,” the Doctor said in an icy voice. “Right now, among them and us, I’m definitely the most dangerous being.” He squeezed his hands as he looked down at Luke. “At least we know they can’t have done much with it, seeing as you still appear to understand one another.”

Nez and Luke shared a look. “Ehm, yeah, of course,” Luke said, “we’re both speaking English, right?”

“Speaking what?” Nez asked, completely baffled.

“Luke Snyder, do not tell me you actually thought someone who is very distinctly not a human being from Earth, but rather came from a completely different part of the universe, just happens to speak modern-day English,” the Doctor said with a deep sigh. “It would be nice if you could appreciate what the TARDIS does for you a bit more just once. This is her translation circuit at work.” He rubbed his temples. “Okay, plan, I need a plan. I have a plan!” He seized Luke by his shoulders. “You’re staying right here, don’t move, and Bao here tells me where I need to go so I can get back the TARDIS. Wait, there’s a flaw in that. Of course there is a flaw, you humans never simply listen! Fine, you just come along with me and try not to get in trouble, you can at least try that, right?”

If people had told Luke he was chaos personified, they hadn’t met the Doctor yet. “I can do that,” he agreed. What else was he going to do, anyway? The TARDIS was his ride home, and home had never been so appealing.

“You’re not leaving us behind,” Nez suddenly said. “I’m coming.”

“Nez, it’s dangerous.” The rapotalis that spoke up now had been silent so far and seized Nez’s arm.

“So is staying here,” Nez said, “eventually. If the Doctor can find us a way home, isn’t that better than to just sit and wait for the end? Because our lives will end here if we do nothing. Either they sniff us out, or we spend the rest of our days in the caves just waiting for the end.”

 

Nez’s argument had been convincing enough for everyone, including Bao and the rapotalis that had tried to stop him before. Luke had assumed they were family, but Nez had denied that, and he’d clammed up when Luke had tried to ask for more.

Yeah, that sounded familiar.

Bao had talked out a strategy with the Doctor and now led the way, though he became more nervous every other minute and eventually fell down on all fours, making himself appear smaller to what was coming.

The Doctor didn’t seem all that comfortable either. “I thought I’d stopped them before,” he told Luke, almost whispering so that the rapotales didn’t hear him. “Ferocious bunch, really. Their kind has found out how to accelerate the life of a star, bringing it to its end millions of years before it’s supposed to. They use that energy as a power source to reach deeper into space, much deeper. All at the cost of countless solar systems over the years, though they tend to choose systems that no longer have life. This clan, however…”

He paused for a moment, though it all sounded too fantastical to Luke to really take in. His mind was still stuck on the ‘no way home’ part. The Doctor rambled on, maybe just to get his mind off the current reality. It wasn’t something Luke necessarily opposed to, except the Doctor’s talk didn’t make things better by a long shot.

“I’ve run into them before, I was there when they were brought in to be judged for their deeds. They found a way to use the black hole at the center of a galaxy – speed it up, make it consume its galaxy in its entirety.” His face darkened. “It was too late to save all of it. So many civilizations… So much lost…”

“Doctor?” Luke carefully said. He didn’t like the change in his voice at all.

Just that little word managed to snap him out of it, thankfully. Maybe he’d been hoping for an interruption. “Yes. Right. Well, judging by the state of this star, I’m guessing they’re close enough to making a ship to get away from here to start looking for fuel,” the Doctor said in his normal space speech voice. “It’s just a little star, however, so they could use an energy boost. Of course, that must be why they took the TARDIS! That’s very bad news for us, of course, unless we get to it first, and thankfully that’s exactly what I had in mind.”

Before Luke could inquire just how exactly he planned on getting it back, Bao stopped and rose back on his hind legs. “We’re here,” he announced, sounding rather nervous.

They’d reached a large rock formation that towered above them, with an opening large enough to fit two TARDISes through while having one balancing on top of the other. It was too dark for Luke to really look into the cave, though by the light the rapotales had brought, he saw something stirring deeper inside.

This was it, then. Onto a confrontation with mysterious and lethal aliens to get back to a space ship. Luke felt he should be much more afraid of what was to come than he really was.

It just seemed almost laughable. He’d survived kidnappings, getting shot, alcohol, only to end up somewhere across the universe to die because of what, death by ridiculously overdeveloped aliens? Solar heat, maybe, if they ended up stuck here? He couldn’t even die like a normal person. Well, if they managed to get out after all, he’d have one hell of a story to tell, if someone would believe him in the first place.

 

Bao and two others of his kind were the first to actually enter the cave, leaving their lights behind in order to go by unnoticed for as long as possible.

After a while, Bao’s tail came out of the cave for a split second, as if to beckon them. Luke had heard enough of the plan to know this signal meant ‘coast clear’, and so, he followed the Doctor and the others inside.

The Doctor seized his arm the minute they’d gotten in and led him along the wall, finding a small nook to hide in. “Stay right here,” he whispered, and then the buzzing sound of the screwdriver device was accompanied by a faint light coming from said device. Luke saw just enough to notice the Doctor had put his finger against his mouth, signaling him to keep his silence. Luke just nodded.

The Doctor stretched out his arm and directed the screwdriver right at the ceiling of the cave. With a simple push on the button, he shot off a rather large piece of rock. It came crashing down with a loud bang, which was followed by a loud and deep scream of agony.

“I think we’ve just lost our element of surprise,” the Doctor said out loud, “Bao, how many?”

“Five more,” came the reply, while Luke felt the rapotales rushing past him, brushing his legs with their long tails.

His eyes were getting used to the darkness now, enough to see the rapotales had taken the initial confusion and shock to lure out the rest of the aliens. It also meant Luke’s first look at the creatures.

The most disturbing part about them was just how much they resembled humans. Huge humans, with hairy arms and faces that looked like they’d once belonged to a raging bull, but still more humanoid than the rapotales. And they were dangerous. It wasn’t just the Doctor’s tale that had convinced him.

The rapotales ran around frantically, trying to distract them from their guarding mission, but they hardly succeeded. Three of the bulls split up from the group and tried to block if not outright take down the rapotales, while the two others were blocking the way deeper into the cave.

Thankfully, they hadn’t counted on the presence of the Doctor and his screwdriver. Almost at leisure, he aimed for the ceiling above the bulls, strategically shooting off rocks. The rapotales were agile enough to get out of the way in time, but the bulls were much larger and took the direct hits.

Miraculously, no-one on their side got hurt. The bulls eventually noticed the Doctor, but not in time to avoid being hit. In the end, the fifth one bit the dust as well, the ground trembling under its weight when it came crashing down. Luke tried not to wonder whether he was alive or dead. Both options were rather frightening by what they implied.

The Doctor pulled Luke along with him again as they rushed deeper into the cave, getting past this first obstacle. Something was shimmering in the distance – a light? The TARDIS?

 

“Well, this is uncomfortable.” The Doctor’s dry remark cut through the dead silence. They’d rushed into the center of the cave without thinking, which had led them into a giant and brightly lit chamber. The Doctor had been right about the bulls building a space ship. A pyramid-shaped mechanical object took up most of the space in the center of the chamber.

A dozen bull aliens surrounding it looked up now, just as surprised to see them as they had been to end up here.

The silence didn’t last long. The bulls shouted something at each other that Luke couldn’t quite make out, but they understood each other – and so did the Doctor.

“The TARDIS, to the right!” he shouted at Luke. “Run for it now or you won’t get another chance!”

Luke hadn’t even noticed it yet, but he was right: the TARDIS stood right next to the pyramid, the door still closed. “It’s shut!” he shouted as he made his way to it.

The Doctor shouted something in return, but he didn’t catch it as the bulls were running around, trying to stop the rapotales from reaching the ship.

“What?”

“I said it’s open now!”

Luke looked around just in time to see the Doctor snap his fingers. Several feet in front of him, the TARDIS made the same sound as a car unlocking. “Oh, you’re kidding me,” he muttered to himself, though relief washed through him now that he was so close.

He came to a halt against the door, which opened under his weight. He could only just catch himself before he tripped inside. Safe, he was safe. As long as he got the Doctor in here sometime, too, of course. The warm lights of the TARDIS welcomed him, but they were pretty useless seeing how Luke still had no clue whatsoever which buttons to press or which levers to pull.

Luke turned around, his back to the TARDIS door. He was just in time to see several of the rapotales rushing into the pyramid ship, much to his surprise.

“Doctor!”

“Bit busy!” the Doctor replied, aiming his screwdriver at the bull aliens. As he was still running, however, he kept missing, and he didn’t aim at the ceiling this time. Probably too dangerous – there were too many innocents he could hit just as easily.

Only a couple of the rapotales were still running around now, but Luke couldn’t tell them apart well enough to know who they were. He was just about to ask when the Doctor rushed into the TARDIS.

It didn’t matter all that much when one of creatures ran straight towards one of the bulls in its panic to get away from the others. The rapotalis was inches away from its fist, the strange metal weapon it was holding in its raised other hand.

“No!”

“Vya!” Luke’s cry came simultaneously with Bao’s, who rushed out of the relative safety of the pyramid ship and simply knocked his ally out of the way.

Luke could only watch how the metal weapon struck.

The weapon hardly made any sound upon impact. Rather it was like Bao got struck by lightning, which sent him up the air for a couple of feet, still twitching when he hit the ground before becoming completely still.

“Bao!” It was Nez crying out from inside the pyramid ship, and his voice completely broke when he called out the second name. “Vya!”

Vya, the little rapotalis that Bao had just saved, had stiffened completely, staring petrified at the bulls in front of him. It was a matter of seconds, less even.

Luke took that short moment to rush outside, seize Vya, and bolt into the door of the space ship. Vya had to be with his family, with Nez; he had to survive, that was all that counted. Bao’s life had been lost, but it couldn’t be in vain. Luke fell down on his knees as he entered, only just allowing Vya the time to escape from his arms.

“Luke! Get back!” It was Nez, pushing his way forward while his family and friends were figuring out the controls of the space ship. “Back to the Doctor!”

“But this ship…”

“It’s okay. Thank you, Luke Snyder of Earth.” Nez softly seized his head, pressed their foreheads together for a split second before he pushed him away. “Now go. We’ll be fine. Go.”

He wanted to protest more, convince them this wasn’t the right space ship and that the TARDIS could take them home, not this ship. But he was pushed out, leaving rushing back to the TARDIS his only option.

It was just a couple of feet, he could do it. The TARDIS was his ticket home, back to planet Earth. It didn’t even matter where he’d end up, as long as he’d be able to travel where he needed to be. As long as I can see Noah again, even if just once. Why in the world had he waited for two years?

The TARDIS door was closed, shut by himself in his rush to get out. There was no time. Whatever they were, the bulls were right behind him and the door wouldn’t budge.

There was only one word on his mind before he felt a sharp sting near his chest and lost consciousness.

Noah.

 

“Awake yet, sleepyhead?”

Luke grunted, slowly opened his eyes. It was to the Doctor’s face; he was leaning over him, smiling and visibly relieved. Something soft was supporting him.

It took a while for him to realize it was a bed, and another while to see it was a bunk bed. “What the hell?”

“You were out for a good four hours,” the Doctor said. “Their weapons work with poison as well as with energy. Quick and effective, mostly, but the poison is not directly lethal on humans, fortunately for you. I dragged you in just in time.” He twirled the screwdriver he’d used before – if it was a screwdriver at all. It looked pretty strange up close, but maybe Luke had hit his head. “Soniced them to keep them off. Didn’t expect that to work so well, though, that first one left quite a dent in that cave. Figures, seeing their origins. I should have thought of that before. Their poison was affected by it, too; a couple of days of rest and you should be as good as new. Well, almost.” He pointed at a spot near Luke’s collar bone.

Luke managed to shove his shirt away from the spot and noticed the strange, almost heart-shaped burn mark there. “Oh.”

“Yes, not sure if that will fade, but it’ll make a nice souvenir if you forget what caused it,” the Doctor said. He stood up now. “Well, you sleep it off, I’ll be back in the console room if you need me.”

“Doctor.” His voice came out rasping, as if he’d been sick for days. He felt like it, too. It could theoretically have been a feverish dream. He had to make sure. “Nez, the others… that was all real, right?”

“As real as you and me. And not to worry, you saved them. Vya is Nez’s little sibling, did you know that?”

Luke weakly smiled. “Not really.” He felt he could have known, and in a way, he had. “But they went into the wrong ship. Are they safe now?”

“As safe as possible.” The Doctor sighed. “The TARDIS pulled the ship out. Good thinking on their part, as we effectively robbed the Fallen Ones of their means of escape. I had to leave them in that system, but the third planet should be safe for the first couple of centuries, and it had enough raw material for them to build a small village. Together with the supplies from the ship, they should manage.”

What? Luke tried his best not to lash out immediately, but he barely succeeded. “Why didn’t you take them home?”

“Because there’s no home for them to return to, Luke.” He was very obviously avoiding eye contact. “Selanzia was destroyed years ago when its moon crashed into it, shortly after your friends left it. Ironic as it may be, that dying sun saved their lives.”

Luke swallowed heavily. “Do they know?”

“I didn’t tell them outright, but your friend Nez felt something was off. It’s not just their eyes that are very sensitive, I’ve always expected them to be slightly psychic. He told me to say hi and thank you to you, by the way.”

Psychic? Ignoring that for a while, Luke still had a lot of questions. Leaning on his elbows, he propped himself so he could face the Doctor and asked the most important one. “Can I go see them?”

“Not unless you want to freeze to death within seconds.” He sounded completely serious. “That planet is so far from its sun it’s too cold for a human to survive there.”

“You told me they were safe!”

“Yes, well, they’re rapotales, not humans,” the Doctor reminded him, “please pay attention to what I’m saying for once. Amazing creatures, really, able to withstand very extreme temperatures and adapt to such circumstances quite easily. No, they’ll be safe, they have some centuries to live.”

“Centuries?”

“Selanzia’s years were a lot shorter than your Earth ones,” the Doctor said, “and they grow to be a lot older than you humans do. Nez could easily be your grandfather, even in Earth years.”

His grandfather. Figures. He should probably be more surprised about this revelation, but he was long past that point. “So are they alone now?”

“Alone in that solar system, yes,” the Doctor said, his voice coming about strangled. “And I’m afraid to say I haven’t heard of rapotales thriving on other planets besides Selanzia. Stranger things do happen, of course, but they might very well be the last of their species, and remain so.”

Luke stared at him, unable to put a word to the emotions he spotted in the Doctor’s eyes. “Can’t you, I don’t know, travel back in the past?” he carefully offered. “Prevent that moon from crashing somehow? You did save that galaxy with the black hole and all, didn’t you?”

“Luke Snyder, one thing you should know about space-time travelling is that some points in time are fixed no matter what.” He was looking away from him, seemingly lost in his own thoughts for a while before snapping out of it. “That galaxy was not meant to collapse yet, and it’s one of the reasons even their own kind took such offense that they banished this clan to the planet we just came from. They were supposed to die a slow and agonizing death there. Selanzia and its moon, however, now that’s another story.”

“And how do you know all this?”

“I’m a Time Lord, Luke. Let’s just say for now that I know certain things.” The Doctor was still standing in the opening of the door, half-turned towards the hallway now. “Why don’t you get some rest?”

“I just did.”

“Rest some more. Trust me, you’ll feel better.”

He’d half closed the door when Luke spoke up again. “Doctor?”

“Yes?”

“You missed your unique sight,” he said with an apologetic smile.

“Yes, well. This place was unique in more ways than one, don’t you agree?”

Yes, indeed. Luke just shrugged in reply, which was answer enough for the Doctor to leave and shut the door behind him.

Luke sighed deeply as he leant back into his pillow. So he was safe now, but he’d most likely never see his new friend again. Great. Had Nez already told him goodbye as well as thank you with that gesture? Had he known they wouldn’t see each other again, probably not ever?

The thought alone hurt, even though he hadn’t even really known Nez and his family all that well. Not at all, really. They’d just seemed so very human Luke hadn’t been able to help himself but get attached to them.

He rolled on his side, deeply sighed. There was a bright side to all of this, of course. He was no longer stuck on a dying planet; he was able to go back now and hold his loved ones close. Make up for lost time in a way.

That thought put his mind at ease enough to fall into a dreamless sleep.

 

“Look who’s awake!” the Doctor exclaimed with a broad grin, when Luke had finally found his way to the control room. The TARDIS took ‘bigger on the inside’ to a whole new level, and he’d spent about an hour walking back and forth a dozen of corridors before accidentally taking the right turn to the control room. “Good evening to you!”

“Evening?” Luke echoed. “I slept for a day?”

“Or it could be morning, or the afternoon, doesn’t really matter until we actually go somewhere.” The Doctor leaned back on the panel. “So, where to next?”

He’d half expected the Doctor to ditch him after all this, and probably rightly so. Luke hadn’t seen this question coming, but the answer was still ready on his lips. “Home.”

The Doctor’s face fell, and Luke felt a short jolt of excitement. Apparently, he hadn’t been such a horrible travel companion after all. “Really?”

“Really. There’s something I… I just want to go home, okay? See everyone again.” My family, see Noah. Spending a day without knowing if he’d ever get back had certainly put things into perspective.

The Doctor muttered something that sounded suspiciously much like ‘humans’ before he turned to the panel and started to press buttons. “Fine, I’ll get you back.”

“Thank you.” Luke grinned. “You really aren’t human, are you? Time Lord. It’s not a title.”

“Well, technically…” The Doctor stopped in his tracks. “You know, you are the alien to me. It’s all a matter of perception.”

“I didn’t use the word ‘alien’, though.”

“No, you didn’t.” The Doctor smiled. “Perception indeed. Okay, one trip to that pond of yours, coming right up!”

 

With the decision made, it didn’t take very long for the TARDIS to travel and eventually land.

One step outside was enough to tell this was planet Earth. Luke hadn’t expected to miss something as simple as grass or a sky darkening into other colors than red, but here he was. The sun was setting and disappearing behind the trees, casting one last reflection on what indeed was the water of the Snyder pond.

After his initial relief, he turned to the Doctor who was still in the TARDIS. “What day is this?”

“The same day as when you left. Just check your laptop if you don’t believe me.”

It was still in the grass, on the same spot he’d left it so carelessly when the Doctor had come along. The screen had gone black, but when he moved the mouse pad, it sprang back into life, proving the Doctor’s point. Granted, it did tell him to rush inside within now and ten minutes to charge it if he didn’t want to lose any of his unsaved files, but the time in the corner told him it was roughly an hour and a half after he’d left. It had seemed like a life time and a half to Luke, and chances were no-one had even missed him.

“Oh, and who might that be?” The Doctor had managed to sneak up behind him, and he was looking at the screen. It was painfully obvious whom he was referring to: the picture of Noah and the still from the movie were still on the screen, and might possibly have been burnt in permanently. Luke wouldn’t really mind if they had.

“It’s nothing,” Luke hurried to say as he minimized the screens.

“Right, I see. Makes perfect sense to collect his pictures, then. Is he a film star?”

“Behind the cameras, yes,” Luke said, not without pride. “But unless he travelled back in time, that’s not him in the still – it’s about fifty years old, and the other picture was taken two years ago at most.” Ouch. He didn’t have all that many recent photos, but he didn’t enjoy thinking about that too often.

“Oh, lots of possibilities besides time travelling,” the Doctor immediately said. “Autons, as they don’t age, or simply spatial genetic multiplicity. He could just greatly resemble someone from fifty years ago.”

“That happens?”

“Oh, yes. Travel as much as I do and you’re bound to run into identical individuals – only in appearance, mind you, and sometimes they have similar names. Who knows, maybe there was a Luciano in, say, the Victorian age who looked just like you.”

Wait a minute. “How do you know my full name?”

“Is it, then? Lucky guess.”

“Hm.” Luke reached to his pocket, only to feel his passport still there, seemingly untouched.

Apparently the Doctor had noticed he was growing suspicious, because he suddenly found the laptop screen of utmost interest. “I’d go charge it if I were you, or you’re going to lose your files,” he read out the warning. “Ah, technology. Do anything you want, just charge in time.”

“Fine, fine.” Luke closed his laptop to save the remaining energy. “What are you up to now, Doctor?”

“Oh, well, the usual I suppose,” the Doctor said, eyeing his TARDIS. “Assuming you want to stay here.” He took Luke’s silence as a ‘yes’. “Traveling, seeing the universe, trying not to get in too much trouble, though that’s generally not my forte.”

“And picking up someone so you can look clever,” Luke added, half-teasingly.

“Well, of course.” He turned back to the TARDIS and Luke watched him, suddenly feeling rather sorry for him. He had a home and a family to return to, but what about the Doctor? He had never mentioned anyone.

“Is this goodbye, then?” Luke asked.

“Well, you want to stay here, I want to travel, so we’re parting ways,” the Doctor said, “that’s usually the point people tell each other things like have a safe trip, see you later, things that generally qualify as goodbye.”

Luke smiled despite himself. “Okay. So, it’s goodbye.”

“Yes, and I’m terrible at it, so let’s make it quick.” The Doctor seized him by the shoulders and looked straight into his eyes, suddenly a whole lot more serious. “Listen, do what it is you need to do, okay? Whatever it may be. Make good use of your time.”

“I will.” He grinned. “You try stay out of trouble, then?”

“Can’t promise anything,” the Doctor cheerfully said, and with those words, he walked back into the TARDIS. “Goodbye, Luke.”

“Goodbye.”

The Doctor lingered in the door for a bit, as if he had something else to say, but he eventually closed the door. With that, Luke was alone, though the TARDIS was still there. He wasn’t a part of it anymore.

The TARDIS made a ‘vworp’ like sound several times a little while later, and then, it was gradually fading away as if it had never been there in the first place. The blue was fading, then the outlines. The next minute, Luke was truly alone, looking out over the pond with the setting sun finally disappearing behind the trees.

 

After a full ten minutes had passed, Luke finally did the one thing he’d been wanting to do ever since he’d decided he wanted to go home. He took out his cell phone, which was now frantically looking for a connection. That’s right, space travel - he was probably lucky it still worked at all.

Once it had connected, Luke dialed the first number in his list.

Noah didn’t pick up. Instead, the phone went straight to voice mail, which was rather odd, considering Noah had to be available at all times these days. They may have grown apart, but he still knew that much. At least it meant he got to hear his voice again, if only in a business-like tone announcing this was Noah Mayer’s voice mail and he should leave a message after the beep.

He cancelled before the beep, not knowing what message he should leave. He hadn’t even known what he was going to say, anyway, so maybe it was best he wasn’t picking up. ‘Hey, I just got back from this planet that shouldn’t exist and barely made it out with my life, and I just really missed you while I was there hanging out with aliens, so can we meet up’? Or how about the classic ‘I was watching this old movie earlier and I thought I spotted you in the background’? Noah would probably put him on hold and call for someone to take him to a mental hospital.

That is, if he would pick up at all once Luke’s name showed up on the display. He hadn’t really done so before, but Luke feared every time that Noah would be tired of waiting and just hang up on him. Well, at least his phone wasn’t on now, so Luke wasn’t the only one who was ignored.

“Let’s charge you, shall we?” he muttered, looking at the closed laptop he had put next to him in the grass.

 

Once he got his laptop settled and plugged in inside, Luke opened his writing programs and stared at the screen for a while. For the first time in ages, the white screen didn’t seem so intimidating anymore.

He’d attempted to write over and over again during the past years, but he always ended up deleting the few lines he had. It had frustrated him too much to even try after a while.

It was different now. The words were forming in his mind, swirling together into sentences, and his fingers had trouble keeping up as they were typing them out.

He had a lot to tell. He wasn’t sure if anyone was ever going to read this particular story, but it hardly mattered. This was something he had to write, and then there could be other stories after it. There would be other stories, that was the point.

Right now, he was writing his own story, or part of it anyway. It was his way of dealing with the past two, three years, the period he’d most needed to write about only to find that he couldn’t. He wasn’t sure what had changed, exactly, but he felt liberated. If anything, he felt more… himself.

Of course, it was kind of hard to ignore what had happened in the past days. Pretty soon, Luke had ended up with two rather large documents. One was a frantic diary of his travels with the Doctor, typed out as the memories came back to him, and likely unreadable to anyone who hadn’t been there. The other story was more composed, thought out, and in another way deeply personal.

Satisfied, he closed his laptop for the afternoon.

 

Later that evening, Luke tried calling Noah again. He still didn’t know what to say, but he was composed enough now not to start rambling about outer space or old movies.

But Noah didn’t pick up, not that evening and not later at night, when Luke tried again before going to sleep. It annoyed him, but it also worried him. Maybe something was wrong? Why else would Noah turn off his cell phone if he could expect calls every minute of the day?

Maybe he’d just lost his charger, Luke eventually reasoned, if only to put his mind at ease before going to sleep. He smiled at the recent memory. Technology indeed.

 

He tried calling Noah once again the next morning, as soon as the time in L.A. was appropriate enough. He still didn’t pick up, so Luke resorted to what he hoped he was good at: writing. He typed a long email to Noah, telling him how he’d tried calling him and didn’t reach him, and asking him if he was too busy to pick up, which was fine, if he could just send Luke a short mail back telling him so.

That put his mind at ease a bit. If something was wrong with his cell phone – or maybe he’d just switched numbers – he’d still check his email, right?

With that behind him, Luke picked up on the work he’d left yesterday before he took off so unexpectedly, only to get it over with fast. He had new ideas for his writing, ideas that could end up being novel-length. In the end, he gave up on work for that day as he found himself switching between his writing program and his email rather than work-related tabs.

 

The weekend came and went, and Luke still hadn’t heard from Noah, in despite of calling him at least twice every day and sending two more emails. It had come to the point even the recent memories were pushed to the background in favor of Noah.

“Mom, have you heard from Noah lately?” he casually asked over dinner, and it would be nice if she could at least pretend not to be ridiculously excited about him mentioning Noah.

“No, honey, but he’s been busy,” Lily said, “he told you so too, right?”

“Yes, but I can’t reach him on his phone. He must have switched it off, because it keeps going to voicemail.” He shrugged. “I just thought it was weird.” So if Noah was ignoring someone, it wasn’t just Luke. That was something, but he wasn’t sure it was a good thing.

 

Luke snapped almost exactly three weeks after he’d gotten back from his trip with the Doctor.

He’d been calling and mailing Noah every day, even going as far as contacting people he’d worked with, but they hadn’t heard from him either. They were mostly frustrated, as Noah had apparently not shown up for various important meetings. Seeing how Noah would never turn up late, let alone neglect to go, Luke thought it would be far more reasonable for them to be worried rather than frustrated.

Luke was both, and that was rarely a good combination.

When he was cleaning his desk that evening, he noticed the DVD of Rain in the dark, which had kept him busy in between for about a week until he’d decided he was just seeing what he wanted to see. The DVD was the trigger.

He thought of that period when Noah had been blind, when they’d had so much trouble, when they lost each other out of sight regardless of one of them actually not being able to see. It hadn’t been an easy time, but had he ever made Noah talk about it, make him understand? How much had they talked anyway, the last couple of years, really talked? He’d been through so much, and Luke had experienced things now he couldn’t share with anyone. Maybe, just maybe, Noah would listen. And he could listen to Noah, too.

 

An hour later, he’d booked the first flight to L.A. he could get.

 

Luke made his way out of the plane as soon as the light telling to keep on his seat belt had disappeared, bumping into quite a number of people and earning himself many an angry face. He honestly couldn’t care less.

He’d only brought carry-on luggage, hastily packed and labeled the evening before, if only to save time he didn’t have to spend waiting for his luggage. Traveling in the TARDIS sure had spoiled him even worse than his grandmother’s private jet already had, but it couldn’t be helped.

He jumped into the nearest cab, giving directions to Noah’s apartment as he felt increasingly ashamed he still hadn’t been there in person. That would change now, as soon as Noah had told him exactly why the hell he was ignoring everyone.

 

After Luke had been ringing the doorbell and tapping the door for five minutes straight, the door next to Noah’s apartment slowly opened, revealing the sleepy face of a young woman.

“Good morning to you too,” she said, drowning half her words in a yawn. “You looking for Noah?”

“Have you seen him?” Luke quickly asked.

She shook her head. “No, but I hardly see him,” she said. “’S very quiet. Sometimes I don’t see him for weeks.”

What a help. “So you don’t know if he’s home?”

“Don’t think so,” she said, yawning again. “You woke me up, so he must be deaf if he’s still in. ‘Xcuse me.” She shut the door, leaving Luke alone.

He lingered on the doorstep, unsure of what to do next. He didn’t dare to knock or ring again, afraid to wake up other neighbors, and he knew by now calling his phone wouldn’t be of much use. He could probably wait for a while here, though he didn’t like the implications. The least innocent reason might be that Noah was just in the shower, but any other possibility implied at least unconsciousness or Noah being away for the night. Luke wasn’t sure which one of those he preferred less.

His thoughts came to an abrupt halt when he heard a familiar sound. He’d only heard it a couple of times, but it was impossible to mistake for something else once you’d heard it. The odds were incredibly slim of it showing up here, but then again…

Without thinking twice about it, Luke ran away from the door, to the street corner where the sound seemed to come from. He had only one thought on his mind, ridiculous as it may be: maybe the Doctor can help.


	3. These distant stars, so close

Noah turned off his cell phone when the number of missed calls had reached sixty and still went up. Something had gone very wrong.

“Tiny mistake,” the Doctor said upon return, holding out his hands in defense. He’d been walking around asking people for something. Noah guessed it was for the date, since there was no newspaper stand nearby. “Little mix-up, not sure how it happened, but…”

“What day is it? Or should I just ask for the year instead?” His hands were trembling, though he was trying his best to remain calm otherwise.

“Oh, it’s still 2012,” the Doctor quickly said, “it’s still the same month, even. Funny thing actually, same number involved, except twice. It’s, eh, the twenty-second,” he finally admitted.

“I left on the second.” The second… This couldn’t be happening. “That’s three weeks. Three weeks I missed out on completely.” He blanked out completely for a couple of seconds, and then his brain went full speed ahead into panic mode. This was bad, this was really bad. All those appointments, all those people he’d let down…

“Well, it could have been worse,” the Doctor said, “and think of the experience!”

Experience. Yes, that was an easy solution. “Take me back,” Noah demanded, “take me back to three weeks ago.”

“I’m sorry, Noah, but I can’t do that.”

“You have a time travel machine, of course you can! I just experienced that, didn’t I!”

“Well, for starters, apparently I will not, or you wouldn’t have missed all those calls,” the Doctor pointed out. It sounded logical, though Noah wasn’t quite sure how exactly. “And secondly, you can’t go back in your own timeline. It’s a violation of…”

“So what, I’m not supposed to change the past? What did we just do, then?”

“It was your future,” the Doctor said, “it just happened to take place in the past from where you were standing, but it wasn’t your past.”

“That’s not making sense.”

“It’s making perfect sense, you just don’t want to see it.” The Doctor sighed. “Look, Noah, I’m sorry, but that’s the way it is. All I can do is take you somewhere else that isn’t your own past.”

“No. No, thanks.” Noah rubbed his temples, trying to calm himself down. “Okay, okay. I just – can you just leave for a second? I can’t do this right now.”

“You sure you don’t…”

“Please.”

“Okay, sure.” The Doctor turned around abruptly and went into the TARDIS, shutting the door behind him.

That was a bit much. “Doctor, wait!”

But he was too late: the TARDIS was making all kinds of noises, and then it started to fade away, as if it had never been there in the first place.

There he was, alone, cell phone still in his hand, in a corner no-one ever looked twice at. This was just wonderful. Three weeks – he’d be lucky if he got to finish his project at all. It made him dizzy to list all the deadlines he must have missed. At some point though, he’d have to deal with it. Might as well be right now, if the Doctor wasn’t going to help him fix it.

Noah was just about to turn on his cell phone again when he heard footsteps. Someone was running, and whoever it was, they were coming his way. He turned around to look.

“Noah!”

He barely had the chance to see who it was, but the arms that were suddenly around him felt achingly familiar. He didn’t need his eyes to know for sure.

Noah answered Luke’s embrace as tightly as he could. He had a lot of questions, but none of them mattered for now. He was here, they were together, and that was more important than how or why.

Eventually however, Luke let go of him, and he didn’t seem all that happy. “Where the hell have you been?!”

“Here,” Noah said, before it dawned upon him Luke might very well be speaking about these past three weeks that had been less than a day for him. This was truly a mess. “Well, not here, exactly, but…”

“I called you for weeks,” Luke said, seizing his shirt as if to make his point. “Every day, Noah, for weeks! You ignored everyone, I even tried calling people here, but they all told me they hadn’t heard from you either. You should get some new friends, no-one even seemed worried.”

“You called…” Noah stopped before he could finish his question, because yes, that was exactly what Luke would do. The Luke he knew, anyway. “I… I went on an unexpected leave,” he finally said. That was vague enough, and pretty much described what had happened.

Except Luke didn’t have any of it. “You?” he sneered. “So unexpected you forgot to cancel your appointments or tell people? Try again.”

Noah sighed. “In all honesty, I don’t think you’d believe me.”

“You’d be surprised by how much I’d believe right now,” Luke said in a lowered voice. It almost sounded like a threat, or maybe a dare – ‘try me’. Had he just been that worried, or was there something else?

Before Noah had found a way to put ‘time travel’ into words that didn’t sound like he’d gone mad, a sound right next to them distracted them both.

It took a couple of seconds for Noah to recognize it, and then it hit him.

The Doctor had taken him literally when he’d told him to ‘leave for a second’.

“Maybe we should go,” Noah nervously said as he grabbed Luke by the arm. If the rate of the TARDIS disappearing was anything to go by, it should start reappearing in about five seconds. That was going to be even harder to explain.

Luke however pulled his arm back, looking in the general direction of the sound as if he was expecting something. “Is that…”

It was too late to pull him back now. The outlines of the TARDIS were becoming visible, colored blue before completely materializing. Still, no-one else turned around to look. It was as if this corner didn’t exist to everyone else, and the noises of the traffic were loud enough to drown out the noises of the TARDIS unless you were standing close, like Luke and Noah were. They were close enough to feel the wind the TARDIS brought with it.

Less than three feet away from them, the blue door opened, and the Doctor stepped out as if there was nothing strange about the whole situation. “As I was saying,” he simply said, “are you sure you don’t want to come and see – oh, you have company!” He noticed Luke and cheerfully wrung his hands. “Hello, Luke! It’s been a while, hasn’t it?”

What in the…

“Three weeks,” Luke replied, to Noah’s utter surprise.

“You’ve met?” he finally managed to bring out, after staring at one and the other.

“Yes, and what a coincidence to see the both of you here,” the Doctor said, sounding not at all surprised by said coincidence. “Earth is such a small world, isn’t it?”

“Well, you’d know,” Noah mumbled under his breath, earning him a sly smile from Luke.

“Is he the reason you’ve been away?” Luke then asked, pointing at the Doctor. He might as well be asking about the weather with that tone of voice.

“What, that’s a good reason now?”

“I told you not much would surprise me,” Luke said. “Then again, we’ve been through some crazy stuff. Space travel barely even makes the top five.”

Noah laughed despite himself. “Yeah, okay, you have a point.”

“Hate to break the reunion, but I was still in the middle of my sentence and you just interrupted my interruption,” the Doctor now said. “I was going to ask you along, Noah, but I guess we can extend the invitation to your spouse.”

Luke sounded as if he’d just choked on something and started coughing, while Noah just felt very, very embarrassed. “Ehm, we’re not…”

“What then, boyfriends? No? Well, it’s not my fault if you haven’t made it official, don’t give me that look.” The Doctor turned around to face the TARDIS. “Well, hop in, we haven’t got all day. Or we do, technically, but I don’t feel like spending it waiting for you two to make up your minds.” And with those words, he went back into the TARDIS, leaving the door open to them.

Luke and Noah shared a look. “Are we going?” the former asked.

“Luke, I have been away for three weeks.”

Luke simply shrugged. “What’s one more day, then?”

 

It really was quite remarkable how convincing one little sentence could be. Then again, it had come from Luke, who had a tendency to convince Noah with very few words.

Luke being right here, with him was still a bit strange to grasp. Noah hadn’t ever come to associate L.A. with being with Luke, and he’d eventually come to accept that. They were in the TARDIS now, of course, but the point still stood. Luke belonged in Oakdale – Noah had just hoped he’d also belong by his side, but he didn’t dare taking that for granted. He was here now at the very least, for Noah, if only to make sure he was okay.

To sum it all up, Noah had fast-forwarded three weeks into the future, reunited with Luke, and entered the TARDIS again in less than an hour. So far for life becoming predictable.

Luke was looking around in appreciation rather than surprise. Of course, he’d been here before, but it was still a bit strange to think they’d shared this experience, though separately. It didn’t seem right.

“Hey Doctor! Is my room taken yet?” Luke playfully called out.

Noah looked at him. “Your room?” How long had Luke travelled with the Doctor exactly, anyway? And why did he care?

“Yes, ‘your’ room?” the Doctor echoed Noah, except he was smiling. He’d appeared on top of the stairs that led to the wardrobe, and he was sporting a sea captain’s hat. “You spent one night in there! Are you planning on staying after all?” He now focused on Noah, who was still not that amused by Luke’s statement. “Oh no, take it up to that room if you’re going to get mad at each other, will you? I’m not having any of that, make up before we’re going anywhere.”

“Where are you taking us anyway?” Luke asked as he looked up the stairs.

The Doctor leaned over the balustrade now, removed his hat and planted it firmly on Luke’s head instead. “To the stars,” he said, winking at Noah. “Now hurry up, go catch up or talk things out or whatever it is you need to do, or this ship isn’t going anywhere. Ehm, it’s the other stairs, Luke. No, that other over there.”

 

Luke eventually led Noah to the right room, though he had to check numerous others on the way.

“Oh,” was Noah’s initial response, because… oh.

“Yeah, a bunk bed,” Luke stated the obvious. “Don’t even ask, apparently it’s cool. I try not to think about it too much.”

Noah just nodded, slightly disappointed. Then again, what had he been expecting? A king-sized bed for the two of them? Actually, he shouldn’t be thinking too much about that, either. Ever since that embrace, Noah had been very well aware of them both avoiding physical contact. ‘Just friends’ had probably never been an option.

“So.” Luke dragged out the word. “Are we fighting? I didn’t notice, but apparently the Doctor did.”

“No, it’s just…” Noah searched for the right words. “You went with the Doctor.”

“Yeah, well, so did you.”

“For one afternoon,” Noah countered, “while you apparently have a room here.”

“Are you jealous, Noah?” Luke asked, sounding genuinely surprised. “Because that’s just stupid. I only went with him to… to escape, I guess.”

“Did you, now?” Noah felt the real frustration bubbling to the surface as he continued. “So L.A. is too far away for you for two years, but when some stranger offers you a ride in a magic box, you go wherever he takes you?” He hadn’t meant to accuse him, not really, but the words had come out before he could stop himself.

Luke responded remarkably calmly, especially for him. “I wanted to escape, that was the whole point,” he said. “Don’t you get it? The Doctor was a way out, or I thought so anyway. I was stuck, and travelling with him was – sort of like reading a book, one that you’re anxious to finish because you’re inspired to write your own stories. Don’t you know that feeling with movies? It was like that. I saw a lot of things, but all I wanted at the end of the day was to just go home again, okay?” He started to sound both worked up and desperate. “I needed to pick up my life, do something, live. Go to L.A. and see you. I almost died out there, Noah, and all I was thinking was how I’d never come to see you.”

He was very definitely avoiding eye contact. Noah approached him, still hesitantly, not sure of what to do.

“Okay, forget I said that,” Luke now said, voice unstable. “That was just – okay, can you please just interrupt me now, or call me out on my bullshit, because I’m starting to feel like an idiot here and I -”

Noah pulled him in at that point, taking off that silly hat and throwing it aside. He then kissed him as if it was the easiest thing in the world, and in fact, it was. It was a very simple course that events were obliged to take, and Noah was glad to help out.

After a very short moment of surprise, Luke started to kiss him back, tentatively at first before eventually leaning in.

They held onto each other even when the kiss at last came to an end. “Hm.”

“You should just stop talking sometimes,” Noah said, his voice hoarse with affection.

Luke smiled mischievously. “Maybe I just like how you shut me up.”

 

That was how the Doctor found them a while later, still in each other’s arms, and he didn’t seem amused. “Oh, come on, what is it with you humans? Can’t get enough of each other while there’s the rest of the universe out there to explore?”

“We made up,” Luke pointed out, his eyes still locked with Noah’s as if to look for approval for that statement.

“Yes, I can see that.” The Doctor sighed and rolled his eyes. “Fine, carry on, just – don’t forget to breathe. I’m genuinely worrying about the human race eventually suffocating into extinction. Now please excuse me, and you can find me in the console room in case you want to go somewhere any time soon, no rush.” He darted off again as fast as he’d come in, but he left the door open.

They could take a hint.

“Should we go back?” Luke asked. “I mean, it’s a nice room and all, but it’s still a bunk bed…”

“Oh, shut up,” Noah muttered, kissing him one last time. For now, anyway.

 

They got lost a little less on the way back, though that only meant they took about fifteen minutes to reach the console room this time.

“Okay, here we are,” Luke announced, “to the stars now, right?”

“Well, I’m afraid you’re just going to be disappointed,” the Doctor said. “Seeing as you were spoiled before, and – hey, where did you leave my hat? I liked that one, it was a personal gift.”

“It’s back in the room, sheesh. And I’m not…” Luke thought that over. “Okay, maybe I’m a little spoiled, but I promise I won’t be disappointed. I’ll try not to look like it, anyway.”

Noah muffled a laugh, while the Doctor was already pulling another lever. “Fine, then,” he said, “go check it out.”

Luke did as he was told and went to open the doors, closely followed by Noah.

He’d half-expected a night sky, and it was indeed what they got – except they didn’t seem to be on solid ground. In fact, it didn’t look like they were anywhere near a surface.

“We’re in space,” Luke said as he admired the view, which wasn’t exactly Noah’s main concern.

“Ehm, we shouldn’t be able to breathe in space, right?”

“No, but the TARDIS is magical,” Luke said with a broad grin. “We should be able to step outside for a bit.”

“Yes, but I would advise you not to do that,” the Doctor said behind them. “Chances are you’ll float away, and then breathing might get a little difficult indeed. And she’s not magical, Luke, it’s simply matter of –”

“No, don’t care, magic sounds much better,” Luke interrupted him, earning him a scowl from the Doctor.

“Fine, magic, if you must insist on using that word. Now please enjoy the view before I get the urge to push you in – below.”

‘Below’ was a very strange concept without a bottom or ceiling as reference. Everything was black, save for the distant lights of stars and a shape near them, probably also below them if you looked at it the right way. It took a while for Noah to recognize it from pictures he’d seen in his high school book. “Is that…”

“The Milky Way, your very own galaxy,” the Doctor confirmed. “Bit of a misnomer really, tastes nothing like milk. More like raspberries.”

Noah gave him a confused look. “Excuse me?”

“I think he’s just kidding,” Luke said as he nudged him. “Though I wouldn’t put it past him. Taste the stars, now there’s a tag line.”

Noah was mostly distracted by the outside world to pay much attention to his words. Very carefully, he was stretching out his arm into the darkness, but there was nothing to feel, not the slightest breeze or resistance. That added some credibility to the whole ‘floating away’ bit. “Can I sit down without getting lost in space?” he asked.

“Oh, sure, knock yourself out. I’ll be right back if you need me,” the Doctor said. He left them alone indeed, taking the stairs that led to the bunk bed room. Well, who knew what other rooms he was hiding along the corridors, he or the TARDIS itself. It was so organic in its shapes it might as well be alive and harbor a secret or two of its own, as far as Noah was concerned.

Okay, onto the sitting down part. Noah knelt and eventually seated himself on the doorstep, his legs dangling in the – air? He wasn’t quite sure if he could still use that word. Half of him was actually pretty terrified, but the other and more prominent half was mesmerized by the view.

There was something very soothing and humbling about the galaxy below. Somewhere among those tiny dots was the sun he knew, circled by planet Earth. That was… okay, maybe that was a pretty terrifying thought in itself, though it was hard to convince himself this was all real. It looked more like a piece of art.

“Can I join you?” Luke now asked, almost in a whisper as if not to disturb him.

“Yeah, sure.” It felt weird he even had to ask, but then again – despite their reunion earlier, they weren’t magically back to where they had been before, TARDIS ‘magic’ or not.

Noah moved aside a bit to make room, and Luke sat down next to him. He looked down for a bit at their legs, slightly amused. “It’s like sitting at the pond without the getting wet part,” he said, followed by a quick ‘ehm’. Maybe the pond and getting wet weren’t exactly the ideal conversation starters indeed.

“So where did he take you?” Luke now asked.

“The past.” That was true, and Luke didn’t have to know how he’d seen him quite recently thanks to the Doctor. Or recently enough, anyway, as there was no way of telling whether the Luke he’d seen had been in the same moment of time he’d been. It wouldn’t be the first time the TARDIS was a bit off with Noah’s timeline. “The late forties.”

“Figures.” Luke smiled to himself. “He took me to the moon first.”

“The moon?” It sounded so cliché Noah was almost suspecting it was an euphemism, but knowing the Doctor a little, he hardly doubted it was literal.

“I told him to surprise me. Then I said the moon was a little lame compared to ‘all of time and space’,” Luke confessed with an rueful smile, “and we ended up on a planet far away from here. That was – interesting.” He fell silent, which was rather unusual for him. Noah was expecting him to start telling him in full detail exactly what was so interesting, but no. Instead, Luke kept staring down, seemingly pondering.

“I’m sorry,” Luke said after a silence. “I’m so sorry, Noah.” He sighed. “And I know I’m at least a year late.”

Late, perhaps, but not too late. “Maybe we both needed that time,” Noah suggested, “to start our own lives, see where we stood and where we wanted to go.”

“May well be, but that didn’t really happen for me.” Luke looked straight at him now. “It took an extraterrestrial trip for me to see that. Okay, maybe just the almost dying part did the trick, apparently I need extreme wake-up calls.” They both smiled. “I’ve started to write again,” Luke then said. “First about the past couple of years and travelling with the Doctor, but I have a lot of other stories I want to tell now. I just had to go back to doing what I love most to work myself out. Took me long enough. And Noah…” He took a deep breath before he continued. “I would have come to L.A. earlier, but I was never sure if I was up for it, if I could be there, you see? By the time I thought I could, so much time had passed I was afraid you’d moved on.”

Noah put his hand over Luke’s and squeezed it, hopefully telling him that he may have moved on, but not from him, and that Luke wasn’t the only one who had been unsure. And Luke got him, as he’d often got him when Noah hadn’t been able to say the words out loud in the past.

They were pretty close already, but Luke now carefully closed the last distance as he rested against Noah’s shoulder.

“The door is still open,” Noah softly told him.

Luke grinned. “I know, we’re sitting in it.”

Noah rolled his eyes. “Oh, come on, you know what I meant.”

“Yeah, I know.” His expression softened. “Thank you.” He sighed once more and closed his eyes for a moment. “We’re going to have some catching up to do, huh.”

“If only about the last three weeks,” Noah agreed, cringing a bit at the thought of ‘three weeks’. There was going to be a lot of mess to clean up once he got back.

Luke must have noticed, for he was the one to squeeze Noah’s hand now. He didn’t let go of him anymore.

 

They were both silent for a while, but it was quite comfortable, for as much as sitting in the opening of a door could be comfortable in the first place. Talking was just pretty strange if everything around you was complete and utter silence. The sheer darkness only amplified the silence. There was still light, of course, emitted from the TARDIS’ inside and the bulb on top, as well as from the faraway stars in galaxies around them. And then there was the Milky Way itself, the bright spiral stretching across space. But there were no clouds, no sun or moonlight, no separate stars in the sky. It almost felt like they were intruding on something no human was supposed to see. They were uninvited, but Noah didn’t feel unwelcomed.

 

“Found my hat,” the Doctor announced behind them, so much later Noah suspected he’d been waiting in the back to find a suitable moment to barge in. “You’re not allowed to borrow my hats if you keep throwing them under beds, Luke Snyder.”

“You all but slammed it on my head, that’s not what I’d call ‘borrowing’,” Luke said, not even taking the effort to look up.

“Luke’s not really captain material anyway,” Noah intervened, earning him a playful nudge, thankfully not strong enough to push him out.

“Well, good thing he’s not in charge, then,” the Doctor said. Luke snorted at that. “So, Noah, enjoying the view?”

“Very much, thank you.” Noah looked up to see the Doctor, who had put his captain’s hat back on and seemed rather taken with the role it provided. He was leaning against the doorjamb so he could share their view on the world outside.

“Good, good. Well, I’m perfectly fine with sticking around here for a while, don’t get me wrong, but how about you two? Interested in some more adventures?”

“Eh.” Okay, maybe staying here for weeks wasn’t really a solution. “Maybe we should get back at some point.”

“Yes – if you could just put us off where you found us, that would be fine,” Luke added. “Ehm, right? That would make the most sense if we’re to return on the same day, wouldn’t it?”

“Yes, it would.” Noah was just happy Luke had taken it for granted they would return together.

“Okay. Whenever you’re ready, then.” The Doctor lingered around for a while, taking in the view himself apparently, even though he’d probably seen countless equally or more amazing views with the TARDIS over the years. He then went back to the console, leaving them alone for just a little longer. Luke and Noah spent that time in silence. There’d be time enough to talk later, they knew that now.

 

“Welcome back to good old planet Earth,” the Doctor announced. It had been a particularly bumpy ride, thankfully not all that long. “Sorry I couldn’t point it out to you exactly, but at least you know now where in the Milky Way you are by approximation.”

“Yes, just in case we ever end up getting lost in space again,” Luke said with a grin. “Thanks for bringing us.”

“Oh, of course.” The Doctor wrung his hands. “Well, you should find yourselves on the day we left this time. You’re both sure you want to step out here?”

Noah chuckled. “You just keep trying, don’t you?”

“Can’t hurt to try.” He shrugged. “Well, off you go then, before those pesky emotions turn up and we actually have to exchange decent goodbyes.”

With that, he opened the door for them for the final time. They got out together, Luke and Noah.

It was quite sunny outside, making for quite a contrast after their trip into space. One of those many tiny dots in the galaxy was the bright disc setting in the sky here, and Noah felt very small for a moment.

“Doctor,” Luke suddenly said, and just in time too; the door of the TARDIS was already closing. “Will we see you again?”

“Oh, you’ll see me again, no doubt,” the Doctor said, “the real question is whether I’ll see you again.” With those puzzling words, he took off his hat and waved it as goodbye. “Take care you two, and don’t forget to breathe!”

“We won’t,” they both promised as they shared a look of amusement. “Goodbye!”

“And a safe trip to - wherever,” Luke added, earning him a final hat wave before the TARDIS closed its door completely.

They took some steps back as the TARDIS was making its now familiar sounds. The box disappeared as subtly as a dream that was slipping as you tried to remember it, fading into thin air until at last, they were truly alone.

It took a while for Noah to come back to his earthly senses. It was also the moment he realized something was off, starting with the fact they weren’t in the forgotten corner they’d taken off from earlier. This wasn’t a corner in the middle of the city; it was the middle of a park. And up there, in the distance, was that…

“Oh, you’re freaking kidding me,” Luke groaned. “The Statue of Liberty?! Seriously?”

Noah was fairly convinced at this point the TARDIS just hated him for some reason. Luke was now switching on his phone, waited impatiently for it to get reception, and quickly called someone – or something, rather, as he just pushed some buttons before he hung up. “Well, you have to admit he kept his word,” he then said. “It’s still the twenty-second.”

“Yes, too bad about that small detail where we’re on the wrong coast.” Noah felt the rush of stress getting a hold of him, but Luke stopped it short as he seized him and forced him to look him in the eyes.

“Noah, calm down. It’s just a few calls away, okay? We’ll get back in L.A. in no time. Heck, grandmother will fly her jet herself if we explain to her we got stranded.”

Noah weakly smiled despite himself; it was probably true, too. “I can buy a ticket, Luke.”

“I know you can. I’m just offering you a ride, take it or leave it,” Luke said. “Granted, it’s not in a blue police box through time and space, and I’m not a doctor with a bow tie and a hat fetish, but…”

“But you’re here.”

“Yeah.” Luke smiled as he put his forehead against Noah’s. “Yeah, I’m here.”

Maybe New York wasn’t such a bad place to get stranded at, after all.


	4. Taking the stars from the night sky

Luke kept his word: he went back with Noah to L.A. and stuck around as Noah made dozens of apologetic phone calls. The project was officially cancelled now. Noah had used a vague excuse of being called away for personal affairs, things he didn’t feel comfortable with discussing. In reality, he intentionally kept it as vague as possible, as he was almost sure he’d slip up at some point if he’d go with something more elaborate. Luke had already made up a whole story involving chasing someone across the country and going into hiding. Either he was talking from outer-space experience, or he’d been watching too much television.

“Well, I don’t think they’ll want to work with me again any time soon,” Noah eventually concluded after one of his final calls. “I’m very lucky I have one investor who didn’t withdraw and is still willing to invest in a new project.”

“You know you can always get a second one,” Luke carefully said. “I believe in you, Noah, so I’d love to help out. But it’s not going to be necessary, there will be others who’ll see your talent.”

“Thanks,” Noah said. “I just hope that’s true. I’m a bit afraid I’m going to end up being blacklisted – it’s hard enough to get a project off the ground these days.”

“Yes, but you have talent and some great finished projects to show. I know, I’ve seen them. You’ll manage.”

Luke sounded so convinced he couldn’t have denied it if he’d wanted to.

At the very least Noah had some space to breathe now, if nothing else. Maybe it was a happy accident. His heart hadn’t been fully into this project, and with so many people cancelling on him before, he wasn’t even sure if he’d ever finished it in the first place. Time would just have to tell if this outcome was a good thing or not.

 

“I can’t believe I never noticed myself before,” Noah muttered, more to himself than anything, but Luke heard him anyway and paused the movie for a bit.

They were lying on Luke’s bed on the farm, pillows propped up behind their backs and the laptop on both of their laps. Noah had come over with Luke for Thanksgiving, much to everyone’s joy.

In the end, Noah had been right – ‘just friends’ wasn’t going to work for them.

“Yeah, and I did,” Luke said, rather taken with himself. “The very first time even.”

“That wasn’t the first time,” Noah said as he waved with the DVD case of Rain in the dark.

“Yes, it was.”

“No, it really wasn’t. I tried watching it with you before.”

“That would explain what it was doing here in the first place,” Luke had to admit, “but not why I don’t remember it at all.”

“Maybe that’s because you fell asleep.”

“Did not!”

Noah grinned as he remembered something else. “You so did. We’d been rather busy before.”

“What…” He caught up with him quickly. “Oh.”

“Yeah. Remember now?”

“Not really, actually.” Luke grinned now, too. “Maybe I need some help refreshing my memory.”

One day, Luke would actually see the end of Rain in the dark, and maybe he’d even appreciate it. That day was not today. The laptop had quickly ended up on the floor, closed down with the DVD still in it – suddenly the desk was too far away.

No, not ‘just friends’, alright. They’d done a lot of talking, and more importantly, listening over the past couple of months. First about the recent past, as that was the easiest. Nothing broke the ice like tales of faraway planets and journeys to the past, after all. The latter was the main reason they were here now as they were, as Luke had been overly excited he hadn’t just been imagining things with the DVD. Noah had mostly been surprised he’d voluntarily watched it, until Luke had admitted it was because it’d brought back memories of him. That’s when the last couple of years had come up.

“I love you.”

“I love you, too.”

It had always been true, no matter what had happened along the way. Simple, three very short words, words that had nonetheless once taken a lot of courage to say out loud. It was easy now, self-evident.

There had been a lot of problems, misunderstandings, people getting hurt in the past years. Talking them out had been one way to make for a possible future together. The other way was more… intuitive.

 

“Hey, Luke?”

Luke had nestled himself against Noah on the couch after a long day of them looking after the Snyder siblings, and looked up lazily when Noah spoke his name. Ethan had almost fallen into the pond again, which was a bit more worrisome as it was rather cold that day; Natalie had thrown a tantrum out of nowhere, and Faith had been fighting with her boyfriend and was just generally unpleasant that week. So basically, nothing new, and all the more tiring.

“Yeah?”

Noah shifted a bit to point out what he’d noticed before, a spot near Luke’s collar bone. “Is that a tattoo or something?”

Luke snorted. “No, Noah, it’s a scar. I’d have more taste than to pick a random blob for a tattoo.”

“Is it from back when…” He didn’t have to finish that sentence, not really.

“Yeah.”

“Hm.” Noah smiled to himself. “I’d almost say it’s a heart.”

“Oh, shut up.” Luke quickly pulled his shirt into place to hide the mark. “It’s – let’s say it’s a souvenir, alright? A memory. You’ve got your movie, I’ve got – this.” He sighed as he caved in. “Oh, and okay, it’s vaguely heart-shaped, if you squint and really want to see it.” He smirked now. “Are you telling me you didn’t notice it before?”

“Of course I did, I just didn’t want to embarrass you. It really does look like a heart, y’know.”

“Oh, and that is embarrassing?”

“I dunno, you tell me.”

Considerably less tired all of a sudden, Luke leaned over to him and kissed him. “It’s funny,” he muttered, “I just have to forget how I got it, and it becomes a good memory. Marked by space travel, I like it.” He softly seized Noah’s head and let his forehead rest against Noah’s, never breaking eye contact.

Noah didn’t know what else to do but to repeat the gesture, and they shared a smile.

“Oh,” Luke eventually breathed.

“What is it?”

“Nothing. I just realized something.” He didn’t elaborate with words as he kissed Noah again, a bit longer this time. “And can I say I’m glad we’re ‘us’ again?”

“You absolutely can.” Their hands found each other quite naturally, intertwining as they should. “And so am I.”

“Good.” Luke’s smile got lost in their next kiss. “Beats space travel,” he then concluded, and Noah silently agreed with that as he held him close.

 

When Noah went back to L.A., Luke didn’t come with him. He’d entered a writing course and he was seriously contemplating going back to school, at least part-time, so that he could continue his work on the foundation. In other words, he was quite busy, but he seemed so happy that Noah felt largely okay with leaving him behind.

It helped that Luke came over barely a month later and stayed for a week, of course.

 

Back in L.A., Noah started up his next project, and he got what Luke had meant when he’d more or less said travelling with the Doctor had inspired him. It held true for him, too, though probably more literally than for Luke. Seeing how the movies that had inspired him in the first place had been realized had made him truly feel that passion again, the passion to create and tell stories with moving images.

In the mean while, Luke had begun to write stories meant for others this time. He’d finished his own story, printed it, and deleted it from his computer afterwards. Noah had been the only person allowed to read some portions of it, though Luke kept the entire story to himself.

“I had to get this out, get it over with,” he told him over the phone. “I’m not putting you through it all again.” He’d written about Noah’s blindness too, imagining what it must have been like, and he’d admitted those had been some of the hardest scenes to write.

“But you wrote about the last year too, didn’t you?” Noah said. “I wasn’t there then.”

“I told you about it, didn’t I? There wasn’t much to be around for, really, I just did what I had to do, nothing more. I didn’t really feel like myself anymore. Maybe it took some weird trip to wake me up, maybe it would have happened anyway. Maybe all I needed was to get on a plane to L.A. as I should have done months ago.” He sighed. “I miss you, Noah.”

“I miss you too,” Noah said. “But I wouldn’t be much fun to be around with now, anyway. You’re busy too, right?”

“Yeah, classes start soon and I’m working on something. I think it might be a novel.” He audibly smiled. “It might be absolutely worthless, but I’m trying.”

He sounded like the old Luke again, though something had definitely changed. Maybe they’d simply matured at this point in their lives. “Well, good luck anyway.”

“Thanks, and you too.” Luke sighed again. “This long-distance relationship thing isn’t really working out for me, though.”

“What do you mean?” Hopefully that didn’t sound too panicked. Noah truly wanted to believe that after all they’d been through, after all the distance that had separated them, the distance between Oakdale and L.A. would be too trivial to break them up.

“It means that I might pop up on your doorstep soon,” Luke simply said, “with some suitcases this time, if that’s alright with you.”

“Absolutely,” Noah hurried to tell him, “but what about school?”

“They have schools in L.A., don’t they? I took the liberty of looking them up.”

 

Luke’s promise was fulfilled a couple of months later, with one small exception. He turned up on set instead of at Noah’s door, which meant the scene they were already having trouble with had to be shot again later. Luke had too much fun slowly sneaking into the scene. For once, Noah didn’t care all that much, not when he could pull him into a long hug.

“So, are you hungry?” Luke asked when they broke apart.

“Sorry?”

“I seem to recall you inviting me for hotdogs when I visited you on set.”

Noah rolled his eyes. “I can’t believe you remember that.”

“You promised me hotdogs, of course I remember.”

“Yeah, I don’t think I said it was my treat.”

“Oh, fine, my treat then.” Luke leaned in to kiss him, quickly and teasingly. “When are you free?”

 

The days passed in relative silence from that moment onwards. Noah’s apartment was a bit small for the two of them, but they made it work, and it wasn’t like they were in all that often anyway. They were both busy, working to make their dreams become reality, and at the end of the day, they had each other.

Things weren’t magically perfect, of course. They argued from time to time, agitated with work or school or some tiny detail that normally wouldn’t matter all that much. Sometimes they just got on each other’s nerves, but they’d talk things out now.

Luke went back to Oakdale every other month, Noah following him there whenever he had the opportunity, to see all the Snyders and his friends there again.

The Snyder pond had really become ‘their’ spot ever since they’d told each other of their travels with the Doctor. Luke had been touched rather than creeped out when Noah confessed he’d wanted to see him and had landed here, though he had scolded him for not coming out of hiding to see him in person.

“Yes, because that wouldn’t have been difficult to explain at all,” Noah had said, and Luke had had to admit he had a point there.

Be that as it may, they spent quite some time at the pond. They went swimming in the summer to cool down, which didn’t work out all the time, and took walks in the winter to enjoy the scenery, which mostly did work out.

 

Now that they had the time to talk without worrying about phone bills or time zones, they found they did quite a lot of that, too. Of course, the Doctor and their time with him were regularly returning subjects of conversation. Luke had seen so many things, been through so much that Noah figured he still didn’t know half of it, no matter how often he talked about it, even over a year after their reunion.

“You’re probably the only one who’d ever believe me,” Luke had said, and that went the other way, too.

Sometimes, Noah wondered about the Doctor himself. He’d just appeared out of nowhere, a bit too eager to take random strangers with him through time and space, but where had he gone off to now? Travelling alone?

“I think he picks up people all the time, really,” Luke said when he mentioned it. “Showing them around a bit before dropping them off again.”

“Well, he did say he was a Time Lord. Maybe that’s part of it?”

“Yeah. Not sure if that’s really what Time Lords do, though.” Luke pondered his own words for a while. “Coming to think of it, he never said there were more of them.”

“Maybe he’s the only one?” Noah suggested. “One person who gets to show other people around and see space and time for themselves, for whatever reason?”

“Or maybe he’s the only one left.” Luke was definitely considering this possibility, judging by his face. “I don’t know, Noah, something about the way he looked when he told me the rapotales were likely the only ones of their kind left… It didn’t sit right with me.”

That wasn’t a comfortable thought. If all the tales had been right, the Doctor had been through quite some stuff most people wouldn’t even survive. If he was the only Time Lord left, what could possibly have happened to make the rest disappear?

“In that case, I think the Doctor is a very kind man.”

“How so?”

“He could just have ignored everyone,” Noah said. “Going his own way, pushing others away. There’s no way anyone would understand what he was going through, is there? So why even bother trying to make them understand? It would be so much easier to just go his own way, but instead, he goes around sharing the good things he’s got left.” He swallowed heavily after those last words.

“Noah.” Luke had seized his hand and squeezed it, not saying another word but asking a lot of questions anyway. Are you okay?

“I’m fine,” He slowly nodded. “Now I am, I think.”

“Good.”

They stayed silent for a while – silence was just as easy as talking these days. It wasn’t uncomfortable, now that there were no things left unsaid that should really be spoken out loud.

“I wonder what he meant,” Luke eventually said. He was changing the subject deliberately with his casual tone, but Noah was grateful for it. “Just before he left. Y’know, with the ‘you’ll see me again, but I might not see you’?”

“Well, he’s the Time Lord,” Noah said, shrugging. “Maybe one day it’ll make sense.”

“Maybe.” Luke smiled. “I do hope we’ll meet him again. I kind of want to tell him thanks for the sense he knocked into me.”

Noah laughed out loud. “Yeah, me too.”

“Oh, shut up!” Luke tackled him into the couch at that, smiling broadly, and Noah gladly complied to his command.

 

It was early January when they went out for a midnight walk to the pond, something Luke had insisted on before Noah even had the chance to suggest it. It was a nice night, too. A bit cold perhaps, but the sky was perfectly clear, with a full moon illuminating it and drowning most of the nearby stars in its light.

That same moon was reflected in the water of the pond, slightly rippled by the soft breeze. Noah caught Luke looking at it for a moment before he smiled to himself.

Of course. He’d been there.

Their travels with the Doctor seemed like an almost forgotten dream now, years later; a dream you remember for how it made you feel rather than for its contents. If they hadn’t shared some of that experience, maybe Noah would have really believed it was a dream by now. Luke had found his own way of reminding himself it was real. One of the stories he was working on to get published had been very much inspired by his trip to the dying planet, though he’d changed the aliens to humans for the story’s sake. Apparently, that had been a surprisingly small step.

“Remembering?” Noah softly asked.

Luke looked up to him, surprisingly happy. “Sort of,” he said, “I was just… thinking.” He leaned against Noah’s shoulder for a bit. “You know, Noah, I’ve meant to ask you something for a while now.”

The tone of his voice had changed. He was trying to sound casual, but Noah heard an edge of tension to it.

He smiled. “That’s funny,” he said, before taking a deep breath. “Me too.”


	5. Epilogue

“How long until they find us here, you think?”

“Five minutes,” Luke promptly said, taking Noah by the hand until they’d reached the pond. “At most.”

“Of course. Oh, well.” Noah drew him in for a kiss, which they both smiled into. It was the first time that sunny day they actually had a moment with just the two of them, a sacrifice they’d only been willing to make for the greater good.

“Y’know, we could go for a swim,” Luke suggested, nodding at the pond. “Cool down a bit. I know I want to.”

“Yes, well, I for one would still like to be able to look at your family with a straight face when they find us, so I think I’ll pass this time.”

“Your loss.” Luke shrugged and pulled him in again, but this time, they got interrupted by a rustling in between the nearby trees. “Ugh, already?” he groaned, quickly stealing a kiss off Noah’s lips. “We should have at least two more minutes.”

Someone now indeed appeared from behind the trees, but they weren’t one of the Snyders’, or anyone else who would be in the area at the moment for that matter. Still, Noah recognized him almost instantly, no matter how many years it had been, and so did Luke by the sound of it.

“Doctor!”

He looked up at Luke’s exclamation. No, the Doctor hadn’t changed a bit, still wearing that ridiculous bowtie and his tweed jacket. “Have we met?” He sounded utterly surprised, much to Luke’s disappointment.

“Come on, don’t you remember us? This is Noah, I’m Luke, you travelled with the both of us – oh, come on now! Did we get so old?”

“Calm down, now,” the Doctor said, “it was an honest question. Things don’t always happen in the same order to me as they do to everyone else, which you should probably know if you’ve travelled anywhere with me.”

“Well, you travel through time and space,” Luke said, “but I don’t see how – oh, hold on. It’s to do with timelines or something, right? We’ve met you, but that hasn’t happened for you yet?”

Noah blinked as he let that information seep into his mind, and the early memories of the Doctor returned. The Doctor knowing his name, the excuse with the screwdriver to get him into the TARDIS, his insistence to take Noah along… “That - makes a surprising amount of sense.”

“Naturally. Now, you’re one step ahead of me, so could you tell me where I am now?” the Doctor asked. “I was actually on my way to New York to meet with an old friend of mine, but it seems the TARDIS took a turn somewhere.”

“Yeah, this is Oakdale, Illinois,” Luke answered, “taking a turn sounds about right.”

“I see. Oh, look at that, a pond. Nice pond, I like ponds. Most of the time. Anyway, these are not the 1930s, by any chance?”

Yikes. Luke remained silent, so it was up to Noah to give him the answer this time. “You’re about ninety years late,” he said, as carefully as possible.

“Oh, dear.” He was remarkably calm – then again, maybe this just happened to him a lot. “Better luck next time. So, twenty-first century then. What are you two all dressed up for?” He gestured at their matching suits. “Can’t be for me, right?”

Luke and Noah exchanged a look, then both started smiling simultaneously as Luke seized Noah’s hand again. “You actually kind of crashed our wedding,” he said.

“Oh?” The Doctor took a couple of seconds to process that information, and once he did, he backed away. “Oh, I’m sorry, excuse me, I’ll leave you two at it.”

“No, it’s okay,” Luke quickly said, “right, Noah?”

“Right. You’re absolutely welcome to stay around.”

“I’m absolutely terrible at weddings, and only slightly better when they’re not my own,” the Doctor said. “Honestly. Trust me on this.”

“Well,” Noah slowly said, with something in mind already. “The ceremony ended just now, so technically, the wedding part is over.”

“Yes!” Luke caught up with him immediately. “You can manage a party, can’t you?”

 

Maybe the Doctor had noticed they actually wanted him to be there, or maybe he just couldn’t resist the promise of a party. Whatever the case, he accepted the invitation rather quickly.

So much for alone time afterwards. They were quickly caught by Natalie, who was so distracted by the Doctor’s appearance she forgot to scold the couple for running out on their own reception. Unfortunately for them, Natalie’s mother followed in her footsteps and was less easily distracted.

“There you are! You can’t just run out on your own wedding,” Lily said, dividing her attention between fixing Natalie’s hair and giving her son and son-in-law a scolding look. “Everyone is waiting for you, and – who is this?” She eyed the Doctor with suspicion, not entirely ungrounded seeing as this was Snyder ground.

“An old friend,” Luke quickly said, “he got a bit lost on his way here.” Unlike the Doctor, he had a harder time keeping a straight face. ‘A bit lost’ was quite the understatement.

“Yes, I deeply apologize,” the Doctor went along with it, “I heard I’m a bit late?”

Lily gave him another look, but nodded in the end. “If you’re a friend, you’re still welcome to the reception,” she then said, “provided the happy couple will follow us there – Luke, Noah?”

Luke mumbled something that could pass for an apology if you really wanted to hear it as he passed his mother with Noah. Lily stayed behind a bit with Natalie and the Doctor, and Noah heard her asking “so, what’s your name anyway? I don’t think I’ve heard about you before” in passing.

“Oh, you can call me the Doctor,” he cheerfully replied, to which Luke rolled his eyes and Noah sighed. This was going to be a treat to explain.

 

After getting the spotlight treatment, Luke and Noah quickly retired into a corner once given the chance. It was just as amusing to see everyone enjoying themselves, or in some cases, making a fool out of themselves.

“Congratulations, dudes!” Casey was suddenly behind them, leaning on both their shoulders and possibly slightly intoxicated. He was pointing at the Doctor, who was moving around with Allison in such a way that it could be referred to as ‘dancing’. “You actually managed to invite someone who’s a worse dancer than the both of you. I didn’t know that was humanly possible.”

“Well, humanly,” Luke muttered under his breath, as Casey slowly released them again.

Noah nudged him teasingly. “Luke.”

“Oh, come on, as if they’d buy the truth.” Luke leaned into him, wrapped his arm around his waist. “How much longer until we get to be alone together, hubby?”

Noah didn’t get the chance to answer him, as the Doctor seemed to have had enough of dancing and had appeared in front of them. “I’ve been thinking,” he said, leaving a silence to linger before he continued. “Seeing as how I got invited to your wedding reception and we are to be well acquainted in the future, I see it as only fitting if I gave you a little present. So how about this – I take you two on your honeymoon, anywhere you’d like.” He smiled broadly at his own offer, until he seemed to realize something. “Oh, unless ehm, I’ll end up doing something that endangers your lives and removes any desire to travel again. No hard feelings.”

Luke snorted. “How much can we say without spoiling your future?”

“Just accepting or declining my offer will do,” the Doctor answered.

Luke looked up at Noah hopefully, and they found their answers in each other’s eyes. “Oh, hell yes! On one condition.”

“Which is?”

“You know that room with the bunk bed?”

Noah hid his face in Luke’s shoulder at that point, smothering a laughter. The Doctor just seemed confused. “Which one?”

Noah really, really hoped that didn’t imply he had multiple bunk beds.

“Yeah, we’re not taking that room,” Luke said.

“Why not? Bunk beds are cool! They’re…”

“Very cool, yes, unless you’re on your honeymoon,” Luke cut him short, “which is what you’re inviting us to, so take it or leave it.”

The Doctor sighed very deeply. “Fine, okay, no bunk beds. That’s a yes, then?”

“Just a second.”

Pulling Noah along with him, Luke sought out his mother, who was trying to keep Ethan away from the cake, not very successfully. “Oh, hi honeys, enjoying yourselves so far?” she asked with a partly-cheerful, partly-frustrated smile.

“Yes, but we have had a change of plans,” Luke said, “we won’t be needing the jet after all. We’ll be leaving for our honeymoon in a couple of minutes, in fact. It was a gift.”

“From that Doctor?” Lily asked. “Well, if you’re sure… I think he’s a bit weird, if you don’t mind me saying so.”

“Oh, he is,” Luke declared. “He really is.” That was as much of an explanation Lily was going to get.

 

The Doctor led them to the TARDIS, though he seemed to have some trouble with orientation.

“How much do you think we can tell him?” Noah asked Luke, hopefully too soft for the Doctor to hear. “I mean, how careful should we be? We basically know his future, so…”

“It doesn’t matter, does it?” Luke said. “Whatever we do, it’s already happened to us, we remember.”

“Yes, but you can change the past, and with it, the future. I know, because I did.”

“Hm.” Luke pondered that for a moment. “Wait. Didn’t he say something about fixed points in time?”

Oh, he was going to chat his way out of this alright. “Yeah, he did,” Noah said. “Things that can’t change no matter what you do.”

“Problem solved, then.” Luke gave him his brightest smile. “We’re as fixed as can be.”

 

The TARDIS turned out to be parked on the exact spot where it had been when Noah had visited the pond without knowledge, or where it would be in the past. Tenses were a very strange thing when talking to the Doctor now, they’d figured that much.

They stayed behind a bit while the Doctor entered the TARDIS.

“Ready, hubby?” Luke asked.

Noah seized his hand this time. “Ready. You like that word, don’t you?”

“Well, don’t you?” Luke pressed a quick kiss on the hand he was holding, allowing the ring to reflect the sunlight. “We’re husbands now, and I intend to enjoy that fact to the fullest.”

The Doctor popped out of the TARDIS now, sporting his sea captain’s hat. “Are you coming or not?”

“Just a sec,” Luke called out to him, before directing himself at Noah again. “I didn’t really let you agree, did you?”

“Not really, but that’s okay.” Noah smiled to himself. “It’s a little disconcerting you were so eager to run away with him again, though.”

“Noah Mayer-Snyder, if I had to choose between you and the rest of the universe, I’d choose you in a heartbeat,” Luke told him almost solemnly, until he cracked into a smile. “But there’s no way I’m saying no if I can have both.”

“Well, that’s comforting,” Noah had to admit. “And Luke?”

“Yes?”

Noah smiled now, too, squeezing his hand one last time before they made their way to the TARDIS. “Same here. Absolutely.”

He knew he’d said the right words when he saw the sparkle in Luke’s eyes. “Let’s go, then.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I actually have tons of notes about space; I have no idea if anyone even remotely cares, so I won't post them here, unless you really want me to.


End file.
